Using a mobile phone as a car key and using Apple Pay induction to pay, do you not feel strange anymore? But in the future, to complete these operations, you may not even need to pull out your mobile phone: you can complete the payment with a wave of your sleeve, and the person who opens the car door can sit in and start the car! The premise is that you only need to wear clothes, a dress with NFC function. A recent University of California study successfully enabled wearers to digitally interact with nearby NFC devices by integrating advanced magnetic metamaterials into everyday clothing.
Moreover, compared to the traditional NFC function, which can only take effect within 10cm, such clothes have a signal within 1.2 meters.
NFC, the full name of near-field communication, needless to say, at least everyone has used to brush the access control and take the subway.
This wireless communication technology is cheap, light in weight and long in life, making it ideal for use on wearable devices.
Flexible magnetic sensing elements can be placed on clothing and these elements can be tuned to the NFC band.
This allows the NFC function to extend the signal range of only 10 cm to 4 feet, or about 1.2 meters.
It sounds like a difficult implementation, but there are three problems that everyone must be concerned about: magnetic field interference, folding clothes, and power supply.
First, the magnetic induction element consists of a microelectronic free loop that is arranged and dispersed, flexible, and flat. Its internal structure avoids human interference through electric field limitation and quasi-static magnetic field. Secondly, the researchers found through experiments that whether the component is bent, folded or kneaded, its performance will not change, that is, it can maintain spectral stability.
In terms of power supply, a wired external power supply is required to connect to the NFC reader. In order to make the size smaller, the wireless sensor does not have its own battery, and also relies on this external power supply. Inspired by the production of modern low-cost vinyl clothing, this magnetic induction element does not require complex sewing technology and wire connections, and the cost of the material itself is not high, and it can be directly "pasted" to ready-made clothes through hot pressing.
Although the top and pants are not conjoined, the data "connection" can be achieved by placing the induction "sticker" below.
This technology is well suited for applications in the medical field, such as the integration of various sensors in the clinic into patients' clothing for centralized monitoring. However, there are also disadvantages, such as the current material can only "survive" in cold water for 20 minutes, in order to withstand the washing frequency of daily clothes, it is also necessary to develop more durable magnetic induction materials.
I don't know if this technology will really be able to reduce the burden that modern electronic products bring to our lives as the author hopes.
Pay attention to the hot wheel, the road of technology is often accompanied, we will see you in the next issue!