Biofunctional textiles

Abstract

The aim of the chapter is to state different new possibilities that textile substrates offer for more specialized functions as Biomedical devices, Cos-metics, Skin treatment, and which are the mechanisms involved in such new applications. How to quantify the transport phenomena from the substrate to the skin, or to surrounding different medium, in which they have to be used.Textiles are covering 80% of the human body and a big percentage of that is in close contact with skin. If the system of vehiculization of the active principles is, carefully, designed, the reservoir effect of the polymeric chains of fibers can play a very interesting role in the delivery of the active prin-ciple. Microencapsulation, lipidic aggregates and nanofibers, have shown very promising experimental results. These results will help to other research-ers to develop, more accurate systems, which will valorize textile substrates, fibers and tissues for the use in more sophisticated fields.