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Cotton shirts less stinky after workouts: Study

Provided by: QMI
Written by: Kevin Maimann, QMI Agency
Jun. 21, 2012

(Shutterstock)

EDMONTON - A squad of shirt-sniffers played a key role in new University of Alberta research into the science of smelly clothes.

Textiles scientist Rachel McQueen and chemistry scientist James Harynuk paired up for a field study examining odour-causing bacteria from sweaty T-shirts.

Participants exercised wearing test shirts -- without deodorant -- over a 10-week period, and a 17-member volunteer “odour panel” assessed the tops in a sniff test at the end of the trial.

The study concluded that cotton shirts smelled less than polyester shirts both before and after washing, and that antimicrobial coating did not appear effective in reducing body odour.

“Doing the analysis was a big challenge in this study. But it’s good, because this is the kind of thing we have to consider when we’re looking at a real-world sample, we’re not looking at a contrived situation,” Harynuk said.

Harynuk also analyzed pieces of each shirt in a series of lab tests that revealed 1,000 to 2,000 molecules on every dirty shirt sample. Researchers found the number of molecules on the cotton shirts dropped significantly more after washing than the molecules on the polyester shirts.

Harynuk said it is not yet known which molecules contribute to causing odour.

“Human sweat, in and of itself, doesn’t smell,” he said. “It’s the microbial action on the sweat, as the microflora on our skin and on our toes (interacting), that’s what generates the smelling compounds and molecules.”

The project was an unusual endeavour for Harynuk, who recalls McQueen approaching him a year ago with the idea.

“We said, ‘Sure, sounds like fun as long as I don’t have to sniff (the shirts) and my students don’t have to sniff them,’” he said.

McQueen said the aim of the research is to find the key to developing a material that resists odour-causing molecules. She said more controlled lab testing will likely be needed to determine which molecules are causing odour and how they bind to different fabrics.

One practical piece to take away from the study, she suggested, is that cotton shirts do not necessarily need to be washed as often as polyester shirts.

“A lot of people don’t even bother doing the sniff test, they just throw it in the washing machine after they’ve worn it once,” she said.

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