- Cooling vest
-
A cooling vest or ice vest or "precool vest" is a piece of equipment worn to cool a person down. Cooling vests are used by many athletes, industry workers, doctors, working dogs, people with Multiple Sclerosis or Hypohidrotic ectodermal dysplasia, and by military pilots and tank crews.
Olympic athletes use the lightweight body cooling vest to pre-cool before events. In advance of the Beijing Olympics in 2008, Nike developed the Nike Precool Vest for Olympic athletes. Intended to be worn for an hour prior to events in the hot and humid conditions in Beijing, Nike reported an expected increase of 21% in an athletes endurance.[1] Other research backs up the improved performance claims.[1] The lightweight Arctic Heat cooling vest was used extensively during the 2004 Athens and 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Vests range in weight from around two to eight pounds, depending on the model. The Nike model is not sold to the public and no information is available. However a number of commercial products of varying weight and cost are available. Some, like the RiteTemp Performance Vest and Hyper Precool Vest, utilize standard cooling gel packs or phase change material, and are designed to hold to the body during movement allowing full normal warm up activity. Cooling vests can use a number of methods. Some modern vests use the adiabatic expansion of compressed air, and can cool a worker for long periods in very hot conditions. Typically, these vests will reduce air temperature by about 25 °F, with a flow rate of no more than about 5 cubic feet per minute on average. Some vests combine neoprene with frozen gels to create a cold compression therapy vest that drives cold deep into soft tissues to lower core body temperature rapidly. Vests can also use chemical packs, however, most vests are essentially heat sinks that cool a person through conduction (although some also dehumidify the thin layer air immediately surrounding the body). Some vests use a layered cooling module system to allow for longer term cooling without creating stiffness in the vest.
Cooling vests are similar in function to the Liquid Cooling and Ventilation Garments worn by astronauts.
Cooling vests and Multiple Sclerosis (MS)
Cooling vests are also used by persons suffering from multiple sclerosis (MS). In multiple sclerosis, nerve fibers become demyelinated which leads to pain and discomfort when temperature is elevated. Nerve fibers may also be remyelinating or in the process of repairing themselves and still be sensitive to elevated temperatures. The cooling vest keeps the patients temperature down reducing the pain symptoms.
References
The Humane Society of the United States and Humane Society International Help U.S. Army Working Dogs Keep Cool in Afghanistan Cooling system integrated into baseball umpire's vest Cooling vests used in treating symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis Cooling vests used in treating hypohidrotic ectodermal dysplasia
This article about sports equipment is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
