Will this T-shirt one day power your cellphone? UCSD researchers think so

Yu Lin holds what researches have dubbed a ‘wearable microgrid’ that can harvest and store energy while the wearer moves or exercises. — San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS

Call it the electric T-shirt. Or, as the researchers at the University of California San Diego have dubbed it, the “wearable microgrid”.

Whatever its nickname, the long-sleeve shirt designed by the brainiacs at the Jacobs School of Engineering can harvest and store energy while the wearer is moving or exercising. The school’s nanoengineers anticipate that someday the prototype will be refined to the point where electronic devices like cellphones won’t have to rely on the electric grid for power but can run on the articles of clothing people wear every day.