A cloth that can be operated with just a gesture?

Microsoft Research is developing a technology called Fabriccio that allows you to manipulate electronic devices on fabric using finger gestures. This is a form that can be used without touching your hands to sew on clothes. To be precise, Fabrizio sews instead of fabric.

Fabrizio uses a transmission/reception antenna embroidered on a fabric with a conductive thread. It recognizes the movement of a finger made at a distance of 10cm from the antenna, and even a gesture like overwriting 3 points with a thumb is also detected.

The basis is Doppler motion detection using Doppler radar that observes the frequency shift caused by the Doppler effect. This is a touchless gesture detection technology that can be operated non-contact by using an interactive cloth. It is said that the detected gesture is processed by a machine learning algorithm to determine what kind of movement it was. 11 types of gestures that do not touch the cloth and 1 type of cloth touch gesture are registered, and they all responded with 92.8% accuracy.

Previously, there was also a smart jacket that Levis and Google collaborated with. By pressing the dongle on the wrist, you can stop or start the music, check the schedule, navigate, command the Google Assistant, and operate the camera. However, since Fabrizio is mainly an aerial gesture, it seems that it will be possible to start a smartphone or launch a designated app by assigning a random gesture such as a pinch or triangle. You can also think of operating an app or game you started in the air. Related information can be found here .