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♤ E-textiles, also known as electronic textiles or smart textiles, are fabrics that enable computing, digital components, and electronics to be embedded in them. Part of the development of wearable technology, they are known as intelligent clothing or smart clothing because they allow for the incorporation of built- in technological elements in everyday textiles and clothes. Electronic textiles do not strictly encompass wearable computing because emphasis is placed on the seamless integration between the fabric and the electronic elements, such as cables, microcontrollers, sensors and actuators. The field of embedding advanced electronic components onto textile fibers is sometimes called fibertronics.
♤ The field of e-textiles can be divided into two main categories:
E-textiles with classical electronic devices such as conducting wires, integrated circuits, LEDs, and conventional batteries embedded into garments. This is the common type of e-textile.
E-textiles with modern electronics directly on the textile fibers. This can include either passive electronics such as pure wires, conducting textile fibers, or more advanced electronics such as transistors, diodes, and solar cells.