Veronika Kapsali (case study)

For her research, Veronika looked at how pine cones close when the weather is wet and open when it is dry. Pine cones do this to give their seeds the best chance of flying far away from the tree so that they can grow into new trees far away. In the rain, the seeds will not fly as far and will end up competing with the mother tree for soil and rain.

After years of research into how pine cones open and close depending on humidity in the air, Veronika made her own synthetic fibres mimic these properties. Those fibres were then woven into textiles. She has now started a company making sportswear with this new material. The new material can stay tightly woven when a runner is cold, but when they get hot the textile’s  weave opens up to let air in to cool the runner down.