114: Design Meets Engineering: The Making of E-Textiles (ft. Madison Maxey)

It's a Material World | Materials Science Podcast

What do wearable medical devices, automotive interiors, and healthcare products all have in common?

Electronic textiles (E-textiles) can be used for all of them!

Generally, the resistance of a material increases when it is stretched. E-textiles enable new form factors for conductive circuitry and new products due to their ability to maintain resistance despite stretching. But what kinds of materials are used in e-textiles, and how can we improve them even further?

In today's episode, we welcome Madison Maxey, Founder and CEO of Loomia, a company centered around the manufacture of flexible circuitry for E-textiles. With her, we discuss:

🔹 What an E-textile is, and several different approaches of manufacturing them.

🔹 Comparisons between E-textiles and traditional circuit boards.

🔹 Material differences in E-textiles for different industries.

🔹 How to market your niche industry or product.

🔹 And much more!

We hope you enjoy the episode! And as always, let us know what topics you’d like us to cover next!

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Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed by either guests or hosts in this show are their own, and do not represent the opinions of the companies or organizations for which they are affiliated.

#FlexibleElectronics #ElectronicTextiles #E-Textiles

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Timestamps:

- Teaser (0:00 – 0:45)

- Intro, Vacation, Episode Highlights (0:45 – 4:03)

- Introducing Madison Maxey (4:03 – 4:46)

- What is an e-textile? (4:46 – 6:33)

- Manufacture of e-textiles (6:33 – 8:22)

- Comparison to silicon and other states-of-the-art (8:22 – 9:46)

- E-textile uses: present and future (9:46 – 11:48)

- Pivotal moments to tie careers together (11:48 – 13:51)

- Prototyping vs. scale-up (13:51 – 15:40)

- Pushing a product to market (15:40 – 17:45)

- Market research: figuring your niche (17:45 – 19:07)

- Industries for e-textiles (19:07 – 22:02)

- Design R&D (22:02 – 23:14)

- Challenges in wearable flexible electronics (23:14 – 25:39)

- Flexible sensors in automotive (25:39 – 27:42)

- Material differences in different e-textile industries (27:42 – 28:39)

- Limiting factors in e-textile (28:39 – 30:45)

- Impact of e-textiles in 5-10 years (30:45 – 33:04)

- Advice that has inspired Madison (33:04 – 36:59)

- Conclusion (36:59 – 37:25)

- MSE Academy (37:25 – 38:29)