MWCNT/Cotton-based flexible electrode for electrocardiography

This paper focuses on the development of a textile-based electrode for electrocardiography (ECG). The development of a textile-based electrode is becoming more significant in the modern society since it provides comfort to the wearer while continuously monitor the specific biosignal of the wearer. Currently, the silver/silver chloride (Ag/AgCl) electrode is mainly used for ECG recording purposes. However, conducted researches show that there are some drawbacks of using the conventional electrode. Therefore, researches are actively carried out to invent new methods of recording ECG signal in order to replace the conventional electrode. In this paper, a flexible textile-based electrode using cotton fabric as the substrate material and multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) as the conductive material is proposed. Cotton fabric is readily available, flexible and lightweight while the MWCNT could be purchased at relatively low cost. Simple method of fabricating the sensor was used by applying the the MWCNT on the surface of cotton fabric using tapioca starch paste as adhesive. Initial result from the experiments shows that the performance of MWCNT/cotton-based flexible electrode fabricated is better than the performance of conventional electrode.