Prof. Dahua Shou, Limin Endowed Young Scholar in Advanced Textiles Technologies and Associate Professor
Prof. Dahua Shou has published a peer‑reviewed paper in one of the most prestigious academic journals, Science, on 28 Aug 2025. The topic of the paper is on sustainable personal cooling enabled by the use of advanced textiles and intelligent wearables.
From 2000–2019, heat‑related causes claimed over 480,000 lives annually, while air conditioning contributed to approximately 12.3% of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., thus fuelling a cooling paradox where more cooling breeds more warming. As heat waves intensify, conventional clothing is reaching its limits. This stand‑alone perspective proposes that sustainable personal cooling is essential for public health, worker safety, and decarbonisation, thus showcasing the leadership of PolyU across the fields of textile engineering, wearable technologies, thermodynamics, and artificial intelligence (AI).
The article lays out a roadmap that unites four pathways—radiation, conduction, convection, and evaporation—towards next‑generation fabrics and smart systems. Highlights include spectrum‑engineered textiles that reject solar load and urban heat while radiating body heat, plus moisture‑responsive, breathable architectures that vent warm, humid air. Materials strategies span high‑conductivity fillers to aerogel‑inspired insulating fibres. Flexible organic photovoltaics with bidirectional electrocaloric modules expand the range of thermal comfort. Particularly, moisture management technologies advanced by Prof Shou enable optimised capillary evaporation, directional removal of sweat droplets, and low‑voltage e‑wicking systems that actively pump sweat for a consistently cool, dry feeling.
Looking ahead, AI‑driven, self‑adaptive garments will learn from real‑time physiological and environmental conditions, harvest ambient energy (tribo/piezo/thermo/moisture‑electric), and orchestrate mode‑selective cooling. Integrated textile sensors and fibre‑based coolers will enable proactive, user‑friendly thermoregulation. Sustainable, monomaterial designs and minimised coatings will enhance recyclability, and standardised metrics are urgently needed to accelerate responsible, at‑scale adoption.
The research was supported by the Research Grants Council, the Innovation and Technology Fund, and PolyU’s Endowed Young Scholars Scheme. Dr Ziqi Li contributed as co-author of the paper.
