Textile Touch-Sensor Array based on Circular and Non-Circular Polymer Optical Fibers

Textiles and flexible textile surfaces can be found in many industrial goods. Due to trends like smart textiles and consumer electronics touchpads and flexible touch-sensitive sensor arrays that can be integrated in these textile surfaces are increasingly in demand. A multi-touch capable textile touchpad based on polymer optical fibers (POF) is presented. For the sensing fibers, different fiber cross sections – from circular to trilobal – are studied for maximum sensitivity and minimum cross talk. Results show that the trilobal cross section improves the sensitivity and the strength of the sensor signal by about 50%.