Every day, Anicet Mbida makes us discover an innovation that could well change the way we consume.
This Wednesday, researchers at Harvard University in the United States developed recycled wool fibers, whose keratin they modified, so that they are able to return to a predefined shape when stimulated.
The goal is to make clothes and linen that folds itself.
Something new in textiles this morning. An innovation that should appeal to those who curl their clothes, a fabric capable of folding itself.
A shape memory fabric!
Imagine: you wash a T-shirt, a sweater or a towel.
And once dry, you blow them through the hair dryer to heat them up.
And they will fold themselves as if they came out of the pressing.
This is what researchers at Harvard University in the United States are working on.
They have developed recycled wool fibers, whose keratin they have modified, so that they are able to resume a predefined shape when stimulated (with heat for example).
The goal is to make clothes and linen that folds itself.
How could it work with a large sheet or a shirt?
It's far from smoky, their work has just been published in the famous journal Nature.
They demonstrated with a small handkerchief that folds up by itself into an origami.
Anicet Mbida asked them about the sheets and shirts, they explained to him that their system could quite simply form crease marks at strategic places that one would only have to follow to fold one's garment.
So no more excuses to curl up your stuff.
Finally, technology could also prevent the clothes from slackening (the sweater or the T-shirt which does not look like anything any more since one pulled on it).
Again, a little heat and the fibers will resume their original shape.