University of Manchester

November 14, 2021

In the Department of Materials, the University of Manchester, researchers in Textiles and apparel are developing advanced textile materials, technologies and products for a variety of applications, from biomedical devices, advanced composites for airplane-space technologies, personal protective devices, sportswear and smart e-textile wearables to digital technology platforms for novel fashion e-business models.

The research starts from small to big scales: Graphene and 2D materials to form and/or functionalised fibres; fibre to form yarns, nonwovens and fabrics; yarns, nonwovens and fabrics to form composites, devices and apparels, buildings and airplanes with innovations in novel fibre spinning, fibre functionalisation, nonwoven fabrication, robotics, textiles and advanced composites, functional property measurements, smart textiles and wearables, body scanning and digital apparel. Theoretical investigations into the sciences have developed advanced models, computational algorisms, databases and computer simulation software to link materials innovations with human biological needs to establish the technology platform to enable next generation of AI fashion and textile supply chain business models in big data environment.

Advanced engineering solutions and technologies have been invented and developed to create novel textile materials and apparel products for making our lives more comfortable and exciting in our daily and professional activities, such as protective clothing for defense and policy forces, sports and outdoor ventures, exploration of space, building up sky high buildings, engineering world record breaking bridges, designing smart cars and high speed trains, manufacturing smart e-textile wearables and soft robots for future soldiers, producing textile implants and scaffolds to fix our sick or damaged organs and tissues, body scanning, as well as developing digital technology platforms for enabling fashion big data e-business models.