Electrochromic fabric devices represent a further extension to the plethora of available literature on conductive fabrics. This article contains a brief overview of electrochromic devices, electrochromic polymers, conductive materials, conductive fabrics, and electrochromic fabric devices. A tabulated list of the perceived colour of a number of electrochromic polymers that is contained herein is designed to serve as an aide to colour mixing studies. The challenges of optimisation and commercialisatiion of electrochromic fabric devices and their mitigating factors are conjectured, along with some future potential applications for electrochromic fabric device technologies.

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A series of smectic liquid crystalline network polymers was subjected to a large uniaxial stress at temperatures far below the clearing temperature. Their dimensional recovery is anelastic showing substantial retained strain. This process produced a temporally stable monodomain state. Upon heating this monodomain from room temperature, recovery of the original film dimensions occurs. The strain recovery (length) curves show a pronounced curvature as the temperature approaches the smectic-isotropic temperature. It is proposed that nanosegregation of netpoints in the smectic structure is responsible for the anelasticity and that the temperature dependence of the shape recovery is consistent with a balance between enthalpic and entropic forces with temperature. An interesting mechanically induced strains ratio (MISR) was observed on heating these prestressed films. Loss of the monodomain structure near the isotropization temperature is postulated to rationalize the shape of the MISR curves.

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