This sensor can allow you to talk to your shirt, blanket!

Zee Media Bureau

New Delhi: Scientists have developed a sensor called SansEC short for "without electrical connection” which can allow you to talk to your shirt or blanket.

This sensor functions using electromagnetic vibrations in the air. There is no need to plug it in the socket or use batteries.

Susan Bernard, owner of Textile Technologies, and NASA team developed SansEC sensors which have the ability to detect a range of conditions, such as moisture.

With various embroidery techniques and a multitude of fabrics, the sensors can be virtually added to existing materials, uniforms or weaved directly, creating a highly resonant sensor at a low cost with no additional weight, NASA said in a statement.

Bernard and her small company in Perrysburg, Ohio, are incorporating SansEC sensors into textile products -- things made of cloth and paper.

Textile Instruments has already made a prototype blanket.

"We're able to detect moisture, temperature and movement," Bernard said, "and we recently know how to interrogate the sensor to read heart rate. We're still very much in the R&D on the heart rate.”

"The challenge is to find uses for the sensors, creating viable products we will use daily as consumers. Our recent communications with venture capital firms indicate they are clamouring for real prototypes. There is a demand for hardware and we have a viable path to produce them," Bernard added.

(With IANS inputs)