#newtechnology : How Radiative Cooling Paints Will Change Our World #shorts #science #nanoparticles

Royal Institution
Royal InstitutionJun 11, 2026

Why It Matters

If widely deployed on buildings and vehicles, the coating could cut air-conditioning energy use and extend range for electric buses by passively lowering interior temperatures, offering a low-energy tool for urban heat mitigation and decarbonization.

Summary

Researchers at UCL have developed a nanoparticle-based radiative cooling coating called Polycool that exploits the atmospheric mid-infrared window to passively shed heat to outer space. The material, which is also superhydrophobic, can lower surface temperatures by roughly 10–15°C in favorable conditions and has been trialed on buildings and in cities including Madrid, Singapore and Adelaide. The team is scaling production to produce 60–80 liters for planned trials on four London buses, aiming to reduce onboard cooling demand without extra energy use. Early day-night test data show tuned emission spectra significantly improve cooling performance versus ambient surfaces.

Original Description

Professor Ivan Parkin — one of the world's leading materials chemists, with over 1,000 publications and an h-index of 126 — takes us from Michael Faraday's ruby gold experiments in this very building in 1857, through to the cutting-edge nanoparticle science reshaping medicine, clean energy, air quality monitoring and building design today. Watch the full talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbmzYz5dEPA&t=1818s
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