The textile material is a highly porous medium consisting of a solid fiber matrix and an air void space. Understanding the process of heat and mass transfer through the fabric system is very important to the textile industry. The purpose of clothing is to provide uniform body temperature under adverse conditions. The ability of clothing ensemble to allow dry and evaporative heat transfer is an important factor in determining its suitability for a given thermal environment and in predicting human thermal comfort during transient and steady state conditions.

Heat and mass transfer through such a system is complicated and coupled. It involves diffusion of heat and moisture, convective airflow, liquid capillary flow and the effects of interaction between heat and moisture (absorption, evaporation and condensation). This paper reviews existing models on heat and mass transfer in fabrics focusing in particular on the models that are related to human thermal comfort.