Effect of phase change cooling vest on related thermal regulation factors in moderately hot environments

Phase change cooling vests (CV) are mostly developed to improve people's thermal comfort in warm or hot environments. In this paper, the effect of a CV on related thermal regulation factor was studied. Physiological parameters (including skin temperature, sweat rate, fingertip blood flow, and ear canal temperature) and conductive heat flux were measured in three air temperature conditions (27, 29, and 31 °C). Results found that compared with no cooling vest (NCV) conditions, the maximum decrement in local skin temperature for the back and chest with CV was 2.5 and 2.1 °C, and for the mean skin temperature (Tmsk), the decrement was 0.8 °C. Simultaneously, the mean conductive heat flux of the back and chest with CV was significantly increased by 28.3% and 234.4%, respectively (p