Embroidery is the textile manufacturing process that offers the greatest freedom in the design of textile structures. In addition to the classic, decorative application, technical embroidery opens up completely new market opportunities. For instance, it enables the processing of surgical suture material as well as biocompatible thread materials or wires into potential medical products, the so-called medical lace embroidery. With the Tailored Fiber Placement (TFP) technology developed by the IPF, ultra-light and structurally optimised parts can be produced in a resource-efficient manner. Furthermore, embroidery also allows the integration of special functionalities in textiles and composite components, including sensors, antennas, conductive tracks or elastic zones.

We establish the groundwork for advancing textile biomaterials through:

• Evaluation of new thread materials for biomedical and technical applications;
• Qualification of new materials as embroidery base;
• Development of individual embroidery patterns;
• Textile testing and structural analysis (by the research groups Structure Characterisation and Visualisation and Material Characterisation) and
• Modelling of the embroidery process (by the research group Material Modelling and Digital Material Research).