Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Letter
  • Published:

Subambient daytime radiative cooling textile based on nanoprocessed silk

Nature Nanotechnology volume 16, pages 1342–1348 (2021)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Decreasing energy consumption is critical to sustainable development. Because temperature regulation for human comfort consumes vast amounts of energy, substantial research efforts are currently directed towards developing passive personal thermal management techniques that cool the human body without any energy consumption1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9. Although various cooling textile designs have been proposed previously, textile-based daytime radiative cooling to a temperature below ambient has not been realized6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13. Silk, a natural protein fabric produced by moth caterpillars, is famous for its shimmering appearance and its cooling and comforting sensation on skin14,15,16,17. It has been recently recognized that silk, with its optical properties derived from its hierarchical microstructure, may represent a promising starting point for exploring daytime radiative cooling18,19,20,21. However, the intrinsic absorption of protein in the ultraviolet region prevents natural silk from achieving net cooling under sunlight. Here we explore the nanoprocessing of silk through a molecular bonding design and scalable coupling reagent-assisted dip-coating method, and demonstrate that nanoprocessed silk can achieve subambient daytime radiative cooling. Under direct sunlight (peak solar irradiance >900 W m–2) we observed a temperature of ~3.5 °C below ambient (for an ambient temperature of ~35 °C) for stand-alone nanoprocessed silks. We also observed a temperature reduction of 8 °C for a simulated skin when coated with nanoprocessed silk, compared with natural silk. This subambient daytime radiative cooling of nanoprocessed silk was achieved without compromising its wearability and comfort. This strategy of tailoring natural fabrics through scalable nanoprocessing techniques opens up new pathways to realizing thermoregulatory materials and provides an innovative way to sustainable energy.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Subambient daytime radiative cooling design for nanoprocessed silk.
Fig. 2: Preparation and characterization of nanoprocessed silk.
Fig. 3: Measurement of the radiative cooling performance of natural and nanoprocessed silk.
Fig. 4: Thermal measurement of wearing nanoprocessed silk and its wearable performance.

Similar content being viewed by others

Data availability

All relevant data are included in the manuscript and Supplementary Information. More detailed protocols, calculations and analyses are available from the authors upon request.

References

  1. Office of Energy Saver. Heating and Cooling US Department of Energy www.energy.gov/heating-cooling

  2. Rödel, H., Schenk, A., Herzberg, C. & Krzywinski, S. Links between design, pattern development and fabric behaviours for clothes and technical textiles. Int. J. Cloth. Sci. Tech. 13, 217–227 (2001).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Cho, S. C. et al. Surface modification of polyimide films, filter papers, and cotton clothes by HMDSO/toluene plasma at low pressure and its wettability. Curr. Appl. Phys. 9, 1223–1226 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Parvari, R. A. et al. The effect of fabric type of common Iranian working clothes on the induced cardiac and physiological strain under heat stress. Arch. Environ. Occup. Health 70, 272–278 (2015).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Hsu, P. C. et al. Radiative human body cooling by nanoporous polyethylene textile. Science 353, 1019–1023 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Peng, Y. et al. Nanoporous polyethylene microfibres for large-scale radiative cooling fabric. Nat. Sustain. 1, 105–112 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Zhang, X. et al. Dynamic gating of infrared radiation in a textile. Science 363, 619–623 (2019).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Cai, L. et al. Spectrally selective nanocomposite textile for outdoor personal cooling. Adv. Mater. 30, 1802152 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Hsu, P. C. et al. A dual-mode textile for human body radiative heating and cooling. Sci. Adv. 3, e1700895 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Raman, A. P., Anoma, M. A., Zhu, L., Rephaeli, E. & Fan, S. Passive radiative cooling below ambient air temperature under direct sunlight. Nature 515, 540–544 (2014).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Zhai, Y. et al. Scalable-manufactured randomized glass-polymer hybrid metamaterial for daytime radiative cooling. Science 355, 1062–1066 (2017).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Li, T. et al. A radiative cooling structural material. Science 364, 760–763 (2019).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Mandal, J. et al. Hierarchically porous polymer coatings for highly efficient passive daytime radiative cooling. Science 362, 315–319 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Yang, Y. & Li, S. Silk fabric non-formaldehyde crease-resistant finishing using citric acid. J. Text. Inst. 84, 638–644 (1993).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Gong, R. H. & Mukhopadhyay, S. K. Fabric objective measurement: a comparative study of fabric characteristics. J. Text. Inst. 84, 192–198 (1993).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Huang, F., Wei, Q., Liu, Y., Gao, W. & Huang, Y. Surface functionalization of silk fabric by PTFE sputter coating. J. Mater. Sci. 42, 8025–8028 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  17. Cai, Z., Jiang, G. & Yang, S. Chemical finishing of silk fabric. Color. Technol. 117, 161–165 (2001).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  18. Shi, N. et al. Keeping cool: enhanced optical reflection and heat dissipation in silver ants. Science 349, 298–301 (2015).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  19. Jin, H. & Kaplan, D. L. Mechanism of silk processing in insects and spiders. Nature 424, 1057–1061 (2003).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  20. Choi, S. et al. Anderson light localization in biological nanostructures of native silk. Nat. Commun. 9, 452 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Shi, N. et al. Nanostructured fibers as a versatile photonic platform: radiative cooling and waveguiding through transverse Anderson localization. Light Sci. Appl. 7, 37 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Rosenheck, K. & Doty, P. The far ultraviolet absorption spectra of polypeptide and protein solutions and their dependence on conformation. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 47, 1775–1785 (1961).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  23. Yang, H., Zhu, S. & Pan, N. Studying the mechanisms of titanium dioxide as ultraviolet-blocking additive for films and fabrics by an improved scheme. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 92, 3201–3210 (2004).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. Wang, J., Tsuzuki, T., Sun, L. & Wang, X. Reverse microemulsion-mediated synthesis of SiO2-coated ZnO composite nanoparticles: multiple cores with tunable shell thickness. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 2, 957–960 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  25. Fan, J. & Hunter, L. Engineering Apparel Fabrics and Garments (Woodhead Publishing, 2009).

  26. Yusuf, M. A review on flame retardant textile finishing: current and future trends. Curr. Smart Mater. 3, 99–108 (2018).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Patil, P. V., Bendale, D. M., Puri, R. K. & Puri, V. Refractive index and adhesion of Al2O3 thin films obtained from different processes—a comparative study. Thin Solid Films 288, 120–124 (1996).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. Mie, G. Beiträge zur Optik trüber Medien, speziell kolloidaler Metallösungen. Ann. Phys. 330, 377–445 (1908).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Steven, E. et al. Carbon nanotubes on a spider silk scaffold. Nat. Commun. 4, 2435 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Zhang, W. et al. Tensan silk-inspired hierarchical fibers for smart textile applications. ACS Nano 12, 6968–6977 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  31. Corbet, J. & Mignani, G. Selected patented cross-coupling reaction technologies. Chem. Rev. 106, 2651–2710 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  32. Riaz, S. et al. Functional finishing and coloration of textiles with nanomaterials. Color. Technol. 134, 327–346 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  33. Rockwood, D. et al. Materials fabrication from Bombyx mori silk fibroin. Nat. Protoc. 6, 1612–1631 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the Micro-fabrication Center of the National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures (NLSSM) for technical support. J.Z. acknowledges the support from the Xplorer Prize. This work was jointly supported by the National Key Research and Development Program of China (grant no. 2017YFA0205700), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 52002168, 12022403, 51925204, 11874211, 62134009, 62121005 and 61735008), the Science Foundation of Jiangsu (grant no. BK20190311), the Excellent Research Program of Nanjing University (grant no. ZYJH005), the research foundation of Frontiers Science Center for Critical Earth Material Cycling (grant no. JBGS2106) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (grant nos. 021314380184, 021314380208, 021314380190, 021314380140 and 021314380150). S.F. acknowledges the support of the US Department of Energy (grant no. DE-FG-07ER46426).

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Bin Zhu, Wei Li.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Artificial Functional Materials, Frontiers Science Center for Critical Earth Material Cycling, Nanjing University, Nanjing, People’s Republic of China

    Bin Zhu, Qian Zhang, Duo Li, Xin Liu, Yuxi Wang, Ning Xu, Zhen Wu, Jinlei Li, Xiuqiang Li & Jia Zhu

  2. GPL Photonics Lab, State Key Laboratory of Applied Optics, Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun, People’s Republic of China

    Wei Li

  3. State Key Laboratory of New Textile Materials and Advanced Processing Technologies, School of Textile Science and Engineering, Wuhan Textile University, Wuhan, People’s Republic of China

    Qian Zhang & Weilin Xu

  4. Department of Electrical Engineering, Ginzton Laboratory, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

    Peter B. Catrysse & Shanhui Fan

Authors
  1. Bin Zhu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Wei Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Qian Zhang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Duo Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Xin Liu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Yuxi Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Ning Xu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Zhen Wu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  9. Jinlei Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  10. Xiuqiang Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  11. Peter B. Catrysse
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  12. Weilin Xu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  13. Shanhui Fan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  14. Jia Zhu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

B.Z., W.L., J.Z. and S.F. designed the experiments. B.Z., Q.Z., D.L., J.L., X.L., Y.W. and W.X. prepared and characterized the materials and also performed the human wearing measurements and analysis. B.Z., X.L., Z.W., J.L., X.L. and N.X. contributed to the optical and thermal measurements and analysis. W.L. performed the outdoor test in Stanford. W.L. and P.B.C. performed the calculations. B.Z., W.L., S.F. and J.Z. wrote the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Shanhui Fan or Jia Zhu.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Peer review information Nature Nanotechnology thanks Liangbing Hu and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Schematic 1, Figs. 1–16, Discussion and Tables 1 and 2.

Supplementary Video 1

Stretching, flexing and twisting of the NP-silk fabric.

Supplementary Video 2

Dynamic twisting test of NP-silk.

Supplementary Video 3

Deformation of silk sample without TT additive.

Supplementary Video 4

Screen printing process.

Supplementary Video 5

Washing test process.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Zhu, B., Li, W., Zhang, Q. et al. Subambient daytime radiative cooling textile based on nanoprocessed silk. Nat. Nanotechnol. 16, 1342–1348 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-021-00987-0

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-021-00987-0

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing