The termination of a space walk by a British Astronaut due to him developing cold hands and losing dexterity, was a graphic illustration of the necessity for an effective heating system capable of being built into garments and supplied with energy from a variety of power sources.

The David Clark Company in Worcester Massachusetts, having heard of the development of Gorix E-CT, contacted the Gorix R&D unit in Southport UK to ascertain if Gorix could be the answer that they were looking for in their search for a glove heating element. At the time of the initial enquiry, Gorix Ltd were unaware of the fact that the David Clark Company had been pioneers and industry leaders in the development of Space Exploration clothing and currently had the opportunity to submit a speculative solution to the cold hand problem that NASA Astronauts had encountered on their recent mission.

A joint development program was set up where Gorix Ltd would supply Gorix E-CT heating elements for David Clark Company to fabricate into a new concept glove. Two alternative designs were finalised, the first heating only the back of the hand in the blood flow areas and the second heating each individual finger. After many months of evaluation, the David Clark - Gorix - NASA Glove is still as yet un-flown, but the moment that we have a guaranteed in space trial, the whole world will know.

Replicas of the NASA-Glove have been exhibited around the world as part of the Design Council Millennium Products Award initiative; countries visited by the travelling exhibition include Argentina, Brazil, Singapore, Korea, India and France where for a few heart stopping moments it was thought that the display glove had been stolen from the exhibition to be found later having been pre-packed for return to the UK, where displays have been held in the Design Museum and the Design Council's exhibition centre on Bow Street London.

Space may be viewed as the ultimate hostile environment, but the depths of the world's oceans, military aviation and expeditionary work in polar regions can also produce temperature situations that can very quickly become life threatening.

Astronauts and deep ocean divers share a common factor in the protective suits that they use in their space and sub-marine undertakings, the fact is that both their suits are heated by warmed water, whilst aviators generally rely upon a suit with a wire matrix built into the inner fabric of their flight suits. In the case of the astronaut, the water is in a captive system and circulated around a matrix of fine pipes interwoven into an undergarment. In the case of deep divers, the warmed water is flushed through the suit, the heated water is usually issued from the command vessel above.

None of these methods are considered acceptable and in the case of the deep divers, it is often extremely dangerous. The aim of Gorix Ltd has been to develop a "user operated, safe, dry, flexible heating system for all types of clothing". This concept will not only have the safety advantage of operating from very low voltages, but by being created from non-metallic composites, will not suffer from degradation by corrosion and will possess the ability to flex and contour without suffering breakage in circuit or electrical conductivity, it will also impart wearer comfort in use.