Straight up about the science of control: Turn down the heat

Excess heat on hair can lead to reduced strength and less gloss. There are ways to fix that though. Read on…

Sandra Lup, Lead Design Engineer, Personal Care at Dyson.  (Dyson)

Your hair reflects the time you live in. We have been researching the science of hair for almost a decade, investing over £100m into global hair laboratories across the world. A team of 30 scientists studied over 1,600 kms of real human hair from around the world over four years.

Many Indian women have quite coarse, long hair which is more susceptible to damage, because of exposure to damaging agents like UV light, mechanical, chemical or thermal damage. When it comes to the use of hair appliances - hairdryers, straighteners, and curling irons - imprecise heat settings and difficulty in styling the back of the head were some of the prevalent problems.

These insights were the catalyst for us to begin exploring the science of how hair should be straightened. To straighten hair, a combination of heat, tension and control is required – heat to break the hydrogen bonds in the hair, tension and compression to reshape these bonds and control to apply the heat and tension evenly.

Flat hair irons apply tension and heat only on the thickest part of the hair tress. The strands at the edges are not clamped, leaving them slack, unheated and leaving flyaways. This requires multiple passes on the same section of hair tress, due to which excess heat on hair may cause reduced strength and less gloss.

However, if the plates can conform to the precise profile of the tress, then with each pass we can apply the correct tension to all the hair strands, for an enhanced style without excessive heat damage. The unique magnesium copper flexing plates, wrap around the tress, applying even heat and tension to all the hair strands, keeping them aligned; and hence requiring less passes. This highly efficient way to style hair means less heat is required, so you achieve your ideal style – with less damage.

This article has been written by Sandra Lup, Lead Design Engineer, Personal Care, Dyson.