Importance

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Abstract

A shoe insert to be used for heating or cooling the foot. They are to be manufactured and sold as pairs of left and right shoe inserts. The insert has a number of components forming a sandwich within a sandwich. The outer sandwich has the shape of a shoe, and is partly adjustable in size to fit a range of shoe sizes. So, the inserts may be sold in sizes, for example, small, medium, and large, and these sizes may then be fine tuned to fit a sub-range of shoe sizes. The inner sandwich is smaller than the outer sandwich. The inner sandwich is a pouch positioned at the instep which ruptures when pressure is applied. This pouch contains a liquid that can then flow into a cushioned region. The cushioned region contains a chemical, which when combined with the liquid from the pouch, emits heat (exothermic reaction) or absorbs heat (endothermic reaction). An exothermic reaction would heat the foot while an endothermic reaction would cool the foot. The bottom component of the cushioned layer has round dimples into which a dry chemical can be placed. Alternatively the cushioned layer can have a liquid different from that in the pouch. Heating can be accomplished, for example, by precipitating a supersaturated solution of sodium acetate in water. Cooling can be accomplished, for example, by combining ammonium nitrate with water.

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