A Dual-Mode Textile for Year-Round Passive Thermal Regulation Combining Radiative Cooling and Solar Heating
Shuqi Zhang, Zhihua Zhou, Xueqing Yang, Cheng Wang, Yuechao Chao, Yahui Du, Huajie Tang, Yan Liang, Yifan Zhou, Weiyi Zhang, Junwei Liu, Jinyue Yan
Abstract
Maintaining a stable body temperature proves to be critical for human survival and functional capacity. However, conventional textiles exhibit significant limitations in preserving thermoregulatory microenvironments during dynamic climatic variations. Herein, we present a dual-mode textile (DMT) that combines radiative cooling and solar thermal harvesting technology to achieve year-round passive thermal regulation. The DMT cooling layer demonstrates an impressive performance with 96.1% solar reflectance and 92.0% mid-infrared emissivity. Under direct sunlight, it achieves an average temperature drop of 6.37 °C, corresponding to an average cooling power of 53.3 W/m 2 . In heating mode, its high solar absorptivity of 90% results in an average temperature increase of 16.3 °C compared to that of ambient temperature. Additionally, the DMT demonstrated excellent mechanical properties and water vapor permeability. Real-world wear tests of the DMT shows a 2.3 °C temperature reduction compared to that of a plain white cotton T-shirt, along with excellent heating performance. Furthermore, simulations indicate that the DMT could cool by ∼5 °C in the summer and insulate by ∼13 °C in the winter compared to conventional clothing. On the whole, this work enables dynamic thermal management across varying conditions, introducing possibilities in the rational design of next-generation smart textiles.