Memory Foam Mattresses
You press your hand into this soft yielding material and you feel it mould itself around the contours of your fingers. You take your hand away, but instead of the material springing back to its original shape, the shape of your hand remains there, moulded into it as if you had pressed your hand into soft sand. It is as though this strange material has memorised the shape of your hand. You continue to watch this ghostly shape, this three dimensional shadow of your hand, but it is changing. Gradually it fades away and the material returns to its original state. Eventually the memory of the shape of your hand has faded away completely. Your hand has been forgotten.
This strange material is memory foam, and from it are constructed some of the most comfortable mattresses available on earth. Its invention dates back to 1966.
Originally called Temper Foam, the material was developed for aircraft seats in order to make them more able to absorb shock and to thus offer greater degrees of both comfort and support in high G situations. Although designed for air bound applications, the material quickly established a niche in a large variety of earthly applications such as medical supports to prevent pressure sores, linings for sports shoes, and crash helmet linings. As the years have gone by, so many more applications for the material have been discovered, leading to the mattresses alluded to above.
The man responsible for this invention was known as Charlie Yost. What he created was polymeric memory foam with open cells. This particular material turned out to have some very special visco-elastic properties; it was soft to the touch yet it was capable of absorbing large amounts of stress. Pressure was evened out over the total contact area so it also provided a high degree of comfort; it was found that the material flowed to form an imprint of what ever was pressed against it and after the object was removed it would return gradually to its original shape.
When you enjoy a great night’s sleep on your memory foam mattress, it is Charlie Yost whom you can thank.
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