Dr Ishara Dharmasena -Loughborough University

Dr Dharmasena’s expertise is in smart textiles, wearable electronics, and nanotechnology-based textiles. He currently works on wearable nanogenerators and electronic textiles for energy harvesting from human motion, health sensing, and communication. His recent work has resulted in pioneering theoretical platforms for the optimisation of nanogenerators and scalable smart textile fabrication techniques.

Dr Dharmasena’s Academy Research Fellowship will develop triboelectrically powered super-smart textiles for remote health monitoring. These super-smart textiles will support people with disabilities by monitoring body movements and transmitting sensor signals to healthcare professionals, while powering their own operations by absorbing energy from the natural motion of the wearer. This will allow rehabilitation practitioners to monitor the progress of the patients and make necessary interventions, which will lead to at-home, low cost, and more accessible rehabilitation care. His work will address some of the key issues currently related to wearable health monitoring. He is working in collaboration with a network of partners such as the UK National Rehabilitation Centre, to achieve this aim.