Protective clothing: three revolutionary textile technologies

The upcoming trend will be protective clothing. This is a point on which many trend experts agree. So cocooning volumes and robust materials are in, but protective clothing doesn't stop at styling. FashionUnited has listed three recent textile technologies that aim to protect us.

Highly buoyant swimwear

By coating cotton with a three-component solution of dopamine hydrochloride, 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane and 1H,1H,2H,2H-perfluorodecyltriethoxysilane, researchers in Wuhan, China, have developed a fabric that can float and support up to 35 times its weight. The process is a one-step process that allows for large-scale manufacturing. The technology could be applied to life jackets, but also to bathing suits and other protective clothing.

Anti-mosquito clothing without insecticide

By observing the way Aedes aegypti - a mosquito carrying viruses that cause Zika, dengue and yellow fever - bites, researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a material that completely prevents mosquito bites. The fabric armor was developed using a computer model based on the researchers' observations. This technology should soon benefit a wider audience as Vector Textiles, a North Carolina State start-up, intends to implement it in clothing soon to be sold in the United States.

h2>Antiviral materials

Antiviral and anti-bacterial materials are on the rise. The one developed by the HeiQ Group, a spin-off of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich, is particularly convincing. The "HeiQ Viroblock NPJ03 is one of the world's first textile technologies to be proven effective against SARS-CoV-2 by an independent institution," the company says on its dedicated webpage. HeiQ Viroblock is designed to inhibit the growth and persistence of bacteria and viruses wrapped on textile surfaces.

The material is primarily targeted at face masks. However, the company has just signed a collaboration agreement with The Lycra Company, so its knowledge of anti-viral materials should be developed at the consumer level.

This article was originally published on FashionUnited.FR, translated and edited to English by Kelly Press.