Enhancing the Conductivity of the Poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)-Poly(styrenesulfonate) Coating and Its Effect on the Performance of Yarn Actuators

Nonconductive commercial viscose yarns have been coated with a commercial conducting poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene)-poly(styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) layer providing electrical conductivity which allowed a second coating of the electroactive conducting polymer polypyrrole through electropolymerization to develop textile yarns actuators. To simplify the PEDOT coating process and at the same time make this process more suitable for application in industry, a new coating method is developed and the properties of the PEDOT-PSS conducting layer is optimized, paying attention on its effect on the actuation performance. The effect of the concentration of an additive such as dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) on actuation, and of PEDOT:PSS layers, is investigated. Results show that on improving this conducting layer, better performance than previously developed yarn-actuators is obtained, with strains up to 0.6%. This study provides a simple and efficient fabrication method toward soft, textile-based actuators for wearables and assistive devices with improved features.
Funding agencies: The authors acknowledge the Erling-Persson Family Foundation,Promobilia Foundation (F17603), Union’s Horizon 2020 research andinnovation program under grant agreement no. 825232 “WEAFING”for their nancial support. E.W.H.J. acknowledges nancial support fromthe Swedish Government Strategic Research Area in Materials Science onFunctional Materials at Linköping University (Faculty Grant SFO Mat LiUNo. 2009 00971). F.E-T. acknowledges Universidad Tecnica de Ambato(UTA-FCIAL-UODIDE-2018-0047-M) for the financial support.