Scalable and Reconfigurable Green Electronic Textiles with Personalized Comfort Management

Electronic textiles, inherited with the wearability of conventional clothes, are deemed fundamental for emerging wearable electronics, particularly in the Internet of Things era. However, the electronic waste produced by electronic textiles will further exacerbate the severe pollution in traditional textiles. Here, we develop a large-scale green electronic textile using renewable bio-based polylactic acid and sustainable eutectic gallium-indium alloys. The green electronic textile is extremely abrasion resistant and can degrade naturally in the environment even if abrasion produces infinitesimal amounts of microplastics. The mass loss and performance change rates of the reconstituted green electronic textiles are all below 5.4% after going through the full-cycle recycling procedure. This green electronic textile delivers high physiological comfort (including electronic comfort and thermal-moisture comfort enables wireless power supply (without constraints by, e.g., wires and ports), has 2 orders of magnitude better air and moisture permeability than the body requires, and can lower skin temperature by 5.2 degrees C.

Automated summary

Electronic textiles are important for wearable electronics, but the electronic waste they produce adds to pollution. A new green electronic textile has been developed using renewable materials and is highly durable, degradable, and comfortable. It also enables wireless power supply and has excellent breathability and temperature control.