Collaborative Interfacial Strategy for Constructing Cotton Fabrics with Flame Retardant, Strain Sensing, and Triple-Mode Thermal Management

Electronic textiles are promising for wearable devices. However, wearable electronic textiles face with challenges such as weak interface binding force, difficulty in multifunctional coupling, insufficient fire safety, and the lack of fabric intrinsic properties. Herein, a flexible and wearable cotton fabric (C-P-M-Cotton) was fabricated via hydrogen bonding, electrostatic assembly, and covalent cross-linking, using Ti₃C₂T_x MXene, phytic acid (PA), and an isocyanate-based cross-linking agent. The integration of fire safety, strain sensing, and thermal management functionalities was successfully achieved in cotton fabric. C-P-M-cotton was utilized as a sensor to detect and distinguish motion and information signals from the body and demonstrated a long-term stable conductivity and sensing performance, only a 10.5% decrease in conductivity, and a consistent resistance signal response curve during 6000 s after one year of storage in air. Additionally, the C-P-M-cotton exhibited thermal management properties in cold climates through a triple-mode heating, including electrothermal heating (100 °C at 10 V), solar heating (59.5 °C at 1000 W/m²), and radiative heating (2.9 °C). Moreover, C-P-M-cotton self-extinguishes after the removal of the external ignition source with a limiting oxygen index (LOI) of 45.1%. This work offers an approach and valuable insights for the development of the next generation of durable wearable flame-retardant electronic textiles, highlighting their potential applications in motion monitoring and thermal management.