The clothes of the future will be able to charge your smartphone

Your T-shirt could one day be used to power the smartphone in your pocket, said Maria Gallucci at Mashable. New "smart" fibers developed by Chinese researchers "can be tailored and woven like cotton — but can also produce and store solar energy, like tiny clean power plants."

Energy-generating cloth could potentially solve the conundrum of keeping our devices fully charged without burning harmful fossil fuels. Unlike other smart textiles, the solar cloth can be cut, sewn, and tailored to a designer's specifications. The technology still has a long way to go before it's ready to wear. The "environmentally unfriendly" dye currently used in its solar cells, for example, is a potential health hazard, and the fabric isn't waterproof. But experts say the first commercial products using solar-generating textiles could be available in "the next five years."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up