How efficient are wearable cooling gadgets : NPR

This summer season, you may discover extra individuals utilizing a gadget to combat the warmth: a horseshoe-shaped fan that sits in your neck and blows air. But can a neck cooling fan actually allow you to?

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

Have you ever observed individuals utilizing these odd-looking devices to combat the summer season warmth, just like the little followers that sit round their necks and blow air? The thought is it helps cool you down, however does it work? NPR’s Bill Chappell is on a mission to search out out.

BILL CHAPPELL, BYLINE: On a late July morning, the solar is already broiling the National Mall in Washington, D.C. The air’s so humid, even a unfastened shirt shortly turns right into a sticky mess. I’m searching for people who find themselves utilizing these neck-cooling followers to get some reduction.

CHRISTA SEGER: Oh, these are superb.

CHAPPELL: Christa Seger is sitting along with her youngsters within the shade close to the Washington Monument. She holds up a fan. It appears like a thick plastic horseshoe that hangs round your neck and has dozens of vents that blow air towards your head.

SEGER: I am unable to imagine how chilly they get.

CHAPPELL: Seger is visiting from Denver the place she purchased two followers just a few days in the past. They price about $25 and might run for 4 to 6 hours. Her daughter’s been sporting one as they stroll to museums and ice cream vans.

SEGER: We have by no means used them earlier than, and he or she liked it yesterday.

CHAPPELL: Some of those gadgets can price a whole lot of {dollars}, however I’m attempting out a fundamental mannequin as we speak.

(SOUNDBITE OF FANS BLOWING)

CHAPPELL: Air begins whooshing previous my ears and neck. It looks like a pleasant breeze. But is it actually doing something? I put that query to Chris Tyler, a researcher in environmental physiology on the University of Roehampton in London.

CHRIS TYLER: They’re doing one thing. What they’re doing is that they are making the wearer really feel cooler.

CHAPPELL: The key phrase there may be really feel. Tyler says a small neck fan could make somebody really feel extra comfy with out really doing a lot to decrease their physique temperature. But as a result of we now have a lot of thermal receptors in our neck and face, it could actually really feel good. But Tyler says…

TYLER: This isn’t a therapy. It’s a bit like enjoying sport with a painkilling injection. The concern remains to be there. It’s simply that you may’t detect it for a little bit bit.

CHAPPELL: Think of the principle technique our our bodies use to chill down.

CECILIA KAUFMAN: The largest factor is having the ability to evaporate the sweat off your physique.

CHAPPELL: That’s Cecilia Kaufman, director of occupational security for the Korey Stringer Institute on the University of Connecticut.

KAUFMAN: The drawback is when it is sizzling and humid, that sweat doesn’t evaporate as shortly off your pores and skin.

CHAPPELL: You may really feel extra comfy utilizing a neck fan, even when it is blowing humid air, however it solely impacts a small space of pores and skin. Tyler says crucial factor is attempting to chill as a lot of the physique’s floor space as potential.

TYLER: So one of the best ways to chill down could be mainly to take all of your garments off, expose the complete physique to the air and let all the sweat evaporate. But you’d get arrested, in order that’s a that is not a advice.

CHAPPELL: Back on the National Mall, we’re all sweating via our garments. The solar is blazing as I stumble upon Jeffrey Pagulong and his son Christof on the Lincoln Memorial. They’re visiting from Boston, and each are sporting neck followers.

JEFFREY PAGULONG: It’s form of, like, 95 levels proper now, and sporting these followers form of helps quite a bit. It cools down your head. So it helps.

CHAPPELL: You can most likely hear the fan there within the background. So I ask, is the noise annoying?

J PAGULONG: Yeah, you may hear the fan, however it’s wonderful. It’s higher to have it. I imply, the noise is significantly better than the warmth, ?

CHRISTOF PAGOLONG: Yeah.

CHAPPELL: As we converse, the warmth index is maxing out at round 103 levels. So yeah, proper now, something appears higher than feeling the warmth. Bill Chappell, NPR News.

(SOUNDBITE OF A.V. HAMILTON AND HIJNX SONG, “DOWN!”)

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