Smart-Fabric-Based Supercapacitor with Long-Term Durability and Waterproof Properties toward Wearable Applications

The rapid development of wearable electronics and smart textiles has dramatically motivated the generation of flexible textile-based supercapacitors (SCs). However, the rapid evaporation of water moisture in gel electrolyte substantially limits the working durability and performance enhancements of the flexible devices. Therefore, a high-performance multifunctional textile-based SC with long-term durability is highly desired. Herein, a poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)/polyacrylamide (PAM) composite gel electrolyte was developed to fabricate multifunctional device with water-retaining and water-proofing properties based on multidimensional hierarchical fabric. And the assembled SC based on composite gel exhibited a superior water-retaining property and long-term working durability (93.29% retention rate after operation for 15 days), whereas the performance of SC based on pure PVA gel declined sharply and only 43.2% capacitance remained. In addition, the assembled SC exhibited enhanced specific capacitance of 707.9 mF/cm2 and high energy density of 62.92 μWh/cm2 and maintained a good stability of 80.8% even after 10 000 cyclic tests. After water repellency treatment, the integrated device immersed in water could still work normally. What’s more, the assembled devices could be charged by a portable hand generator, which could be potentially applied for field rescue and military applications. We foresee that this strategy would be a potential route to prepare high-performance multifunctional textile-based SCs for wearable electronic systems and smart textile applications.