Fig. 3

Thermal performance evaluations. a Schematic representation of the thermal measurement set-up, which measures the required set-point of ambient temperature for a textile to maintain constant skin temperature at constant heat generation rate. b Measured set-points of ambient temperature for bare skin and skin covered with textile samples. In the notation of cotton/Ag/PE, cotton/PE/Ag and PE/Ag/cotton, the layer on the left is in contact with skin and the layer on the right is facing ambient environment. Mylar blanket_R and Omni-Heat_R correspond to the reversed Mylar blanket and Omni-Heat, respectively. In the reversed case, the metallic side is facing outside. For the measurements of Mylar blanket and Mylar blanket_R, a cotton layer was added below them to ensure that they have the same conductive insulation as the other tested textiles. c Comparison of warmth-to-weight ratio between cotton/Ag/PE and cotton. d Thermal imaging and photos (insets) of human body wearing garments made from radiative heating cotton/Ag/PE textile and traditional textile, respectively. All error bars represent the standard deviation