CPS: Breakthrough: Toward Personal Microclimate: Sustainable Heating Through Smart Clothing

中央供暖模式一直与服装一起发挥作用，服装在很大程度上通过隔热来保存身体热量。该项目将平衡推向了身体解决方案，使用主动身体加热与绝缘和被动热保护相结合，以加热个体人体而不是整个环境。动机假设是，如果热量可以有效地传递给个人？的身体，那么需要加热大（往往是空的）空间将显着减少。然而，如果身体加热技术被广泛接受，它们必须在日常环境中舒适和可穿戴，同时也要保持身体像中央供暖一样舒适。这是一个挑战，因为身体？人们对热舒适度的感知受到面部和手部温度的强烈影响，在这些区域，可穿戴技术在日常情况下可能会造成阻碍或社交尴尬。该项目将开发舒适的、社交上微妙的可穿戴技术，既能保持身体热量，又能向这些关键身体区域提供额外的热量，并评估它们在加热空间保持热舒适性和降低舒适环境温度的能力。如果成功，这些技术有可能提供大规模的节能，但也允许个性化的热舒适，每个居住者选择他们的最佳温度。由于问题的跨学科性质，该项目将有助于从几个贡献学科的学生的教育，并将介绍项目和研究机会，以学生在本科和研究生课程。这里提出的研究重点是开发和热室评估舒适，社会适当的方法，提供加热到这些敏感地区。其次，这些技术对可接受的环境温度（和由此产生的节能）的影响进行了评估，在现场试验。最后，概念的边界在早期阶段的探索，通过身体温度调制的说服性接口扩展。该提案的智力价值在于它有助于开发有效的传感器/致动器技术，用于与物联网和环境设备一起调节个人微气候，并建立微气候对人类舒适度的相对影响的边界（以及对能源消耗的相应影响）。拟议研究的更广泛影响最直接地包括在寒冷气候中大量节省用于供暖的能源成本的潜力。纳入本研究的教育计划将有助于工程的跨学科性和多样性。

The central-heating paradigm has always functioned in tandem with clothing, which for the most part conserves body heat through insulation. This project tips the balance toward on-body solutions, using active on-body heating in conjunction with insulation and passive thermal protection to heat the individual human body rather than the entire environment. The motivating hypothesis is that if heat can be delivered effectively to the individual?s body, then the need to heat large (and often empty) spaces will be significantly reduced. However, if on-body heating technologies are ever to become widely accepted, they must be comfortable and wearable in everyday environments, while also keeping the body as comfortable as central heating currently does. This is a challenge because the body?s perception of thermal comfort is strongly influenced by the temperature of the face and hands, areas where wearable technologies can be obstructive or socially awkward to wear in everyday situations. This project will develop comfortable, socially subtle wearable technologies that both preserve body heat and deliver additional heat to these key body areas, and evaluate their ability to maintain thermal comfort and reduce the comfortable ambient temperature in heated spaces. If successful, such technologies have the potential to offer both large-scale energy savings, but also allow for individualized thermal comfort, with each occupant selecting their optimal temperature. Because of the interdisciplinary nature of the problem, this project will contribute to the education of students from several contributing disciplines, and will introduce project and research opportunities to students in undergraduate and graduate coursework. The research proposed here focuses on the development and thermal chamber evaluation of comfortable, socially appropriate methods of delivering heating to these sensitive areas. Second, the effect of these technologies on acceptable ambient temperatures (and the resulting energy savings) are evaluated in a field trial. Finally, the boundaries of the concept are extended in early-stage exploration of persuasive interfaces through on-body temperature modulation. The intellectual merit of the proposal lies in its contributions to developing effective sensor/actuator technologies for modulating individual micro-climate in conjunction with IoT and ambient devices, and establishing the boundaries of the relative influence of micro-climate on human comfort (with corresponding effects on energy consumption). The broader impacts of the proposed research most directly include the potential for a large savings in the energy costs spent on heating in cold climates. The education plan integrated into this research will contribute to interdisciplinarity and diversity in engineering.