Development of a Prototype E-Textile Sock

Published in: 2019 41st Annual International Conference of the IEEE

Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC)
Date of Conference: 23-27 July 2019
Date Added to IEEE Xplore: 07 October 2019
INSPEC Accession Number: 19044970
DOI: 10.1109/EMBC.2019.8856739
Publisher: IEEE
Conference Location: Berlin, Germany, Germany

Abstract:
The aim of this work is to design and develop a sensorized sock in Electronic
Textile (ET), SWEET-Sock. The device has been realized by three textile
sensor placed in a specific points of plantar arch and an accelerometer unit,
both embedded and connected by conductive thread. The sensors allows the
acquisition of plantar pressure and acceleration signals deriving from the
motion of the lower limbs. The detected biosignals have been condictionated
by a voltage divider and then were acquired through a LilyPad Arduino
microcontroller and transmitted using the Simblee BLE technology to a custom
made mobile app. Data were afterwards uploaded through a smartphone on a
dropbox cloud where a custom made MATLAB GUI platform has been
developed for further digital signal processing of main biomechanical
parameters of clinical interest in postural and gait analysis.

I. Introduction

Technology today plays an increasingly important role in daily activities both in

terms of interaction to obtain information or to facilitate an action, but also as an
apparently inactive and omnipresent instrument that monitors our life. Recent
advances in miniaturization of electronic devices and in the field of mobile and
ubiquitous computing have led to a significant increase in the interest of several
industry field for wearable devices. The concept of wearable corresponds to a
device that is always connected to a person (which can be transported constantly),
which is comfortable and easy to store and use, and that is unobtrusive like
clothing