Some Facts About Memory Foam Mattresses

Memory foam has been around since it was invented in 1966, but it has only been by and large available for about twenty years, although twenty years ago scarcely anyone could afford it.

One of the early uses of memory foam was for mattresses for the bed-ridden. This is because memory foam mattresses help minimize pressure on the skin touching the bed, which reduces the likelihood of bed sores and gangrene.

In those early days such mattresses were prohibitively expensive so only hospitals and the wealthy could afford them. However, the cost of memory foam mattresses has sharply over recent years and now they can even be purchased on Amazon and.

To begin with this special foam was developed by one of NASA's spin-off research companies, so it is a product of the space program. At the time, scientists were attempting to find a safer material for use in cushions and pillows for the aeronautical industry.

They came across this foam, but NASA permitted the right to make it, the patent, to pass into the public domain.

A Swedish company took up the quest and made orthopaedic mattresses with it because of its capability of moulding itself to a body's individual shape due to that body's heat and weight, thus supporting the body at more points than a traditional mattress. It is this additional support that reduces pressure on the skin and so reduces the possibility of bed sores.

Another property of memory foam is its structure. Normal foam is manufactured up of masses of bubbles per cubic inch which are in effect sealed off pockets of air. You body heat warms this air up and so keeps you warm.

This can be a good or a bad thing according to the ambient temperature, but standard foam is always warm.

On the other hand, the cells or bubbles in memory foam are not sealed off completely so air can course between them. That means that warm air can escape and be replaced by cool air.

This permits you much more control over the temperature of the mattress by regulating the temperature of the room.

There are two kinds of memory foam high density and low density. One reacts to heat and the other to pressure (or in this situation, body weight). Most memory foam mattresses are manufactured up of a mixture of these two types of foam so that the top layer reacts to the heat of your body and shapes itself around you, whereas lower layers react to your weight in the same way, according to how heavy you are.

The lower layers will permit the flow of cool air and this will be transferred to the upper layer, keeping your body cool. One point to make on this subject is that because memory foam mattresses react to heat, if you live in a hot country, the foam will become quite flaccid because of the ambient heat. Therefore, if you live in a hot country, the mattress will have to be that much thicker to allow more air to circulate.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on a number of topics, but is now involved with the Visco Elastic Mattress. If you would like to know more, please visit our website at Egg Crate Mattress Pad For Sale.