Clothing fabrics affect body odour

Are there clothing fabrics that beat body odour?

Freshly secreted sweat has little smell, although some people are more prone to sweating, and more prone to body odour. But researchers say that the clothing a person wears while exercising can affect the amount of odour emitted from the body (Wellbeing No. 154, 2014; wellbeing.com.au – Applied and Environmental Microbiology).

Fresh sweat in armpits has little odour because the fatty acids are generally too large to become airborne. However, bacteria live in armpits and warm spaces in the body, and when micrococci use their enzymes to transform fatty acids, hormones and amino acids into smaller compounds, the result is smelly airborne substance – i.e. body odour. So it is bacteria that make sweat smell.

But there are also bacteria that appear on clothes. Researchers showed that micrococci will grow on polyester but not on cotton. Therefore, researchers recommend that if you don’t want to smell in the gym or while exercising, swap polyester gym clothes for cotton ones.

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