Engineers have unveiled a stretchable solar-power generating skin, complete with tiny embedded batteries.

“The components are electronically connected via flexible copper-polymer interconnects, mounted on a highly elastic silicone core, and enclosed within a silicone shell,” the research team said.

“The resulting system could stretch up to 30 per cent without detectable loss in solar power generation.”

The material could have major implications for wearable tech, particularly for health and safety monitoring, personal fitness and telecommunications.

A small device like a Fitbit or Apple Watch could soon seem cumbersome, with the ability to embed their functions direction into fabrics or create smaller, thinner wearables.

“The authors demonstrated the use of these systems for continual logging and wireless transmission of body temperature data in a variety of realistic scenarios, such as monitoring skin temperature during physical exercise and bathing, and measuring temperature changes during breathing,” the research reads.

The full report is accessible here.