8 Smart and functional textiles for personal thermal comfort

Textiles are considered the most versatile and cost-effective materials that can maintain personal thermal wellbeing by controlling the indoor and outdoor thermal atmosphere. However, traditional textiles cannot efficiently maintain the thermal comfort of an individual. Therefore, textiles engineered with advanced thermoregulation systems can enhance personal thermal comfort (PTC) by regulating the thermal atmosphere. This chapter summarizes the a progress of novel materials integrated into thermoregulation textiles for PTC. The fundamentals of thermal comfort, including heating and cooling principles and strategies for fabricating thermoregulation textiles, have been highlighted, followed by a discussion of different passive heating and cooling textiles. The subsequent section has presented a brief overview of thermal comfort by responsive textiles follows. The conclusion highlights the challenges and prospects of thermoregulation textiles.