Impact of varying lactate concentration in sweat on liquid moisture transmission behaviour of layered ensembles

Abstract

The present study is focussed on the impact of change in the lactate concentration (43 mM and 22 mM) in sweat solution on liquid moisture transmission behaviour through the clothing. The sweat solution with higher concentration of lactate (43 mM) shows delayed wetting at the top surface both in case of individual layer and multi-layer fabric ensembles, i.e. it takes longer time to wet the top surface in spite of the lower contact angle made by it. Significant difference is observed in in-plane transmission behaviour of both the sweat solutions in the case of multi-layered ensembles. In case of multi-layered ensembles, wetting time reduces drastically, even though both the ensembles consist of polyester knit as the inner surface possessing wetting time is 50 s approximately. Sweat solution with higher lactate concentration also shows higher cross-planar transmission rate as compared to in-plane transmission. Uni-directional seamed multi-layered spacer fabric exhibits better overall moisture management coefficient as compared to bi-directional seamed spacer ensembles with sweat solution containing higher lactate concentration. Middle layer also plays a vital role in altering the overall liquid moisture transmission behaviour.