Imagine shirts, pants or socks that clean and remove unpleasant smells themselves when hung on your balcony – how would that be? If you ask me, few things could be better!

After we recently told you about the jaw dropping superhydrophobic spray, we have another fantastic material which is reported to be able to clean itself of stains and bacteria (which causes unpleasant smells) when exposed to ordinary sunlight.

Mingce Long and Deyong Wu, who worked on the fabric explained it uses a coating made from a compound of titanium dioxide, which is present in a lot of white things – from white paint to sunscreen cream. What titanium dioxide does is kill microbes and break down dirt, which is a major benefit of white paint.

Authors do admit that self cleaning clothes have been created before, but they only cleaned themselves when exposed to UV light – which is much more complicated than with normal light. The cotton fabric is coated with nanoparticles made from a compound of titanium dioxide and nitrogen which have the ability to destroy bacteria without damaging the clothing.

Enjoyed this article? Join 40,000+ subscribers to the ZME Science newsletter. Subscribe now!