Just in time for spring: disaster ready-to-wear

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While fashion designers are busy trotting out new lines with miniskirts and sheer tops, one farsighted entrepreneur is taking fabric technology in a different direction.

Dr. Ronald DeMeo — a Florida-based anesthesiologist and pain-management specialist who developed the world’s first fabric to protect against radiation as well as chemical and biological agents -- has fashioned the material into first-responder body suits and vests, now available to the general public.

Although the suits are intended for police, firefighters and military personnel (the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the National Guard have purchased them) they are also available for home use, says DeMeo.

In fact, Radiation Shield Technologies, which makes the suits, has been approached by a number of consumer clothing manufacturers for non-hazmat applications, such as using the fabric in dive and outer gear. DeMeo originally developed the fabric as an alternative to the heavy, shrouded lead vest with matching gloves and goggles used to protect medical personnel against X-ray exposure.

The fabric, called Demron, is a partially woven material made of polyurethane, polyvinylchloride and high-atomic-number salt particles that either absorb or disperse radiation. ‘It has been successfully tested to block gamma rays and X-rays, as well as other nuclear emissions, by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory,” as well as at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, says DeMeo in a press release.

For more information on Demron suits, go to http://www.radshield.com/

--Janet Cromley