Woolen Respirators for Thermal Management

COVID-19 pandemic recently has a great impact on personalized protection and healthcare, especially in the area of the respiratory mask. However, due to the complex relationship between filtration performance and thermal management, there is a lack of investigation considering both characters in respirators. Woolen knitwears are recently well acknowledged as textiles for both hot and cold because of their superior water-actuated shape memory performance. To incorporate protective function against bacteria, virus, microdroplet, and particulate matter, melt-blown polypropylene can be introduced as a barrier layer. Herein, a robust and sustainable bio-based woolen respirator with the superior ability of thermal management is prepared using simple knitting and melt-blown technology. The as-prepared respirators provide excellent protection from airborne particulate along with the high level of comfort, compared with a commercial mask. Moreover, it exhibits a high rating during wear trial. This provides a new insight to develop high quality sustainable respiratory mask with an excellent comfort performance from functional biomaterials.