Power dressing’ may soon have a very different and literal meaning. Scientists in the US have developed novel brush-like fibres that generate electrical energy from movement. Weaving them into a material could allow designers to create ‘smart’ clothes which harness body movement to power portable electronic gadgets. Writing in the journal Nature, the team say that the materials could also be used in tents or other structures to harness wind energy. ‘Our goal is to make self-powered nanotechnology,’ Professor Zhong Lin Wang of the Georgia Institute of Technology and one of the authors of the paper told BBC News. ‘Airflows, vibrations – all these are mechanical energy that we can harvest to power devices.’ Dr Dianne Jones, technical director of textile electronics firm Fibretronic, said that as the market for wearable electronics expands, technologies such as the nanofibres would become increasingly attractive. ‘Any new power source which could provide a more integrated and soft solution in place of conventional hard battery technology would be very attractive for clothing or other electronic textile-based applications,’ she said. Ottilia Saxl, chief executive of the Institute of Nanotechnology, believes the technology could also find a use […]