Here’s some more depth, tho’ the full paper is behind a paywall: Self-sustaining personal all-day thermoregulatory clothing using only sunlight https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adj3654

This just sounds like snake oil

We’re still waiting on electrocaloric fridges and heat pumps. Getting it solar powered, flexible, safe to wear, and more effective than conventional warm/cool wear seems a way off.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

This can be a problem in extreme environments, from subzero polar temperatures to the ruthless heat of the Sahara, and it doesn’t stop at Earth.

A team of researchers, led by Ziyuan Wang of Nankai University in Tianjin, China, has created a flexible, solar-powered device that can be incorporated into clothing and regulate the body by actively heating or cooling the skin.

This flexible material functions as an insulator, integrating a solar cell outside the polyvinyl with an electrocaloric device underneath.

“With these two working modes, bidirectional controllable thermoregulation for cooling and warming can be implemented as needed,” the researchers said in the same study.

Wang proposes a suit with heating-cooling panels attached to the front and back of the chest, arms and legs.

While this thermoregulatory tech may not be available yet, Wang is hopeful that it could be a significant breakthrough for those who have to work in extreme environments, even astronauts who have to brave the freezing darkness to go out on a spacewalk.

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