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Managing temperatures in particularly hot and sunny climates can be very difficult even today. You can use air conditioning to move heat from inside structures and vehicles, but it absorbs so much energy and can cause pollution that further aggravates temperature problems.
Now, a team of scientists from Columbia Engineering has come up with a solution that could be much more effective in keeping things cool and that you can apply just about anything.
In a new article published in Science, the researchers describe how they envisioned a paint-like coating that facilitates so-called "passive day radiative cooling" or PDRC. The PDRC occurs when a surface can effectively emit heat and reflect sunlight to such a degree that it cools even though it is exposed to direct sunlight.
The blindingly white paint is often seen as a simple way to keep something cooler in the sun than usual, but as Columbia explains, it is not as effective that she could be it. The pigments in the paint tend to absorb certain wavelengths of light, even if they are slightly colored. The researchers had to come up with something different.
Their newly invented coating features "nanoscale air voids that act as a spontaneous air cooler", which is a very technical and sophisticated way of saying that the coating is able to stay cool by itself.
"The air voids in the porous polymer disperse and reflect sunlight, because of the difference in refractive index between the air voids and the surrounding polymer," Columbia writes in a message. "The polymer becomes white and thus avoids solar heating, while its intrinsic emittance effectively makes it lose heat in the sky."
This sounds great, but the best news is that it can be applied to just about anything, from cars to spaceships and even to entire buildings. The team believes that their invention would be an invaluable resource for developing countries in choking climates where air conditioning is impractical or unavailable.
Image Source: Columbia Engineering
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