Smart T-shirt for Body Condition Monitoring

Sensitive Monitoring of Body Activities 

The common project job of the whole development team was to create a prototype of a smart T-shirt. Our task was to develop the hardware and support the production phases of the prototype. 

The requirement for the main functions of the T-shirt was to acquire various body status data, e.g., heartbeat, breathing monitoring, oxygenation, ECG, and body temperature.

During the concept phase, we recognized a few challenges. One of them was to discover how to monitor a breathing activity in a simple way. We also coped with finding appropriate material for reliable ECG electrodes for ECG. Overall, electronics were subject to IP68 protection; therefore, we had to solve the connector sealing and use case of washing.

Modern Technologies Helped Us Achieve Modern Product 

Consilia was responsible for the whole hardware design. We found a preliminary sample source of ECG chips from one of the top leading semiconductor producers. 

We cooperated with a textile specialist on the implementation of the wires. We also implemented breathing monitoring using a special snake-shaped wire part and sensor of its inductance.

All the complex electronic parts were situated on a tiny PCB within a plastic enclosure. As usual today, some plastic parts were produced using a 3D printer.

Cooperation of Several Expert Teams on Unique Product 

At the time of our participation in the project, smart T-shirts were unique products, and the product series outcoming from our prototype became a valuable member of the customer’s portfolio in wearables. 

The customer appreciated our experience and flexible approach in such a pilot project, in addition to the collaborative skills among various competence groups, e.g., firmware, hardware, mechanical, and textile.

Electronics Built in Textile Structure 

The whole T-shirt stems from a standard sports underwear portfolio. We equipped the textile skeleton with special textile electrodes, implemented hidden wires, and agreed on the fixture for the plastic enclosure with the textile expert.

Inside the plastic box, we placed a PCB with and ECG chip, BLE module, and low noise differential amplifiers.

We participated in the integration of our hardware part with the firmware functionality to deliver a successful and working solution.

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