BRITE Pivot: Manufacturing, Mechanics and Actuation of Liquid Crystal Elastomer (LCE)-based Architected Fabrics

About This Grant

This BRITE Pivot project supports research that intends to advance the development of next-generation smart fabrics that can sense, adapt to, and interact with their environments autonomously. While current smart fabrics integrate sensors or actuators into textiles, they typically depend on external hardware or human intervention to function, limiting their potential for true autonomy, energy efficiency, and lightweight design. This research seeks to address a fundamental challenge: how to design textile materials that can physically respond to environmental changes—such as heat or light—without relying on traditional electronic controls or power systems. By embodying physical intelligence directly into the material and structure of the fabric, the project aims to create self-regulating textiles that change shape or stiffness in response to stimuli, enabling applications in wearable healthcare, rehabilitation, human-machine interfaces, and responsive clothing. The research supports the national interest by promoting the progress of science and engineering through interdisciplinary innovation across advanced manufacturing, smart materials, textile engineering, and soft robotics. It also fosters workforce development and public engagement through educational outreach, including programs for K-12 students. By reducing the complexity and cost of smart fabric systems, this work has the potential to impact diverse fields such as personalized medicine, assistive technologies, responsive architecture, and sustainable fashion design. The objective of this BRITE Pivot research project is to uncover the fundamental mechanisms that govern physically intelligent architected fabrics constructed from liquid crystal elastomer-based fibers. The approach in this project combines direct ink writing of liquid crystal elastomer fibers with controlled twisting and weaving to create fabric structures that autonomously adapt their shape and mechanical properties in response to external stimuli. The research is organized into three thrusts: (1) scalable fabrication of high-performance, thermally responsive fibers and their integration into textile architectures; (2) mechanical modeling to understand the coupling between material properties, fiber geometry, and fabric architecture; and (3) actuation studies to characterize and optimize adaptive behaviors such as bending, curling, or stiffness tuning. The project seeks to contribute new theoretical frameworks for modeling complex, twisted fiber structures, and generate predictive tools linking material and structural design to functional output. It also explores how embodied physical intelligence can reduce the need for traditional sensing and control systems. The knowledge gained looks to establish design principles for a new class of intelligent fabrics, with potential to transform how responsive materials are used in wearable and soft robotic systems. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.