Liquid cooling and ventilation garment

While this technology is most commonly associated with space suits, it is also used in a wide range of Earth-bound applications where open-air cooling is difficult or impossible to achieve, such as fire fighting, working in steel mills, and increasingly, by surgeons during long or strenuous procedures.

In situations where the wearer must stay in place inside a vehicle, heavy but long-term-operation heat exchangers can be used, such as a refrigeration system to cool the liquid.

Astronauts commonly wear a liquid cooling and ventilation garment in order to maintain a comfortable core body temperature during extra-vehicular activity (EVA).

The LCVG accomplishes this task by circulating cool water through a network of flexible tubes in direct contact with the astronaut's skin.

In an independent space suit, the heat is ultimately transferred to a thin sheet of ice (formed by a separate feed water source).

Due to the extremely low pressure in space, the heated ice sublimates directly to water vapor, which is then vented away from the suit.

These garments, vital for temperature regulation in environments where traditional cooling is ineffective, have been utilized in the military, sports, and various medical fields.

[6] In the medical sphere, LCVGs have been used for conditions like hypohidrotic ectodermal dysplasia, where patients are unable to sweat and regulate body temperature.

These garments have also been effective in treating multiple sclerosis, peripheral neuropathy, epidermolysis bullosa, spina bifida, and cerebral palsy, by providing controlled cooling to the body.

[8] LCVGs have been employed in industrial settings to aid workers who wear heavy protective clothing or work in hot environments.

One example is in the Dune franchise, where characters wear suits known as "stillsuits" that closely resemble the function of LCVGs,[citation needed] designed for survival in the harsh desert climate of the fictional planet Arrakis.

[clarification needed] Other films that have featured similar technologies include Prometheus and Interstellar, where characters don advanced suits for extraterrestrial exploration.

A man wearing a liquid cooling and ventilation garment for the Space Shuttle / International Space Station Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU)