Electricity-conducting yarn could soon be woven directly into the clothing of British soldiers, replacing cumbersome batteries and cabling, researches said.
Uniforms made out of so-called e-textiles could function as a single, central power source for a soldier's equipment, Intelligent Textiles, based in Surrey, said.
"We have built-in conductive yarns that then take power and data to where it needs to be," Asha Thompson, Intelligent Textiles director, told BBC News.
Soldiers would have to recharge only one battery instead of many and would not be hampered by numerous cables, the company said.
"One of the problems with conventional cables is that breakages can be catastrophic," Thompson said. "What we do here is build in redundancy, so that if the fabric gets cut, damaged or torn, we still have a way of re-routing the data.
"We've got the fabric integrated into the vest, into the shirt, into the helmet, the backpack, and into the glove and weapons platform," she said.
Field trials will be held in May, the company said, and the system could be in limited use by the end of the year.
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