Functionalized Carbon Nanostructures for Smart Electronic Textiles

In the Internet of Things era, the design of smart electronic textiles (e-textiles) is evolving at a fast pace and revolutionizing the textiles and clothing industry. Textronics is becoming a key player for a plethora of applications, including healthcare, sports, fashion, transportation, aeronautics, and defense. Carbon-based nanomaterials are outstanding building blocks that are driving innovation in the market of wearable electronics. This chapter provides an overview of the engineered design of functionalized and hybridized carbon-based nanomaterials for the development of innovative smart e-textiles. The advances achieved in the areas of flexible integrated circuits, energy harvesting and storage, self-powered technologies, communication, lightning, thermal management, and sensing will be highlighted. In the last section, the main conclusions, challenges, and future directions will be presented.