Does your nose wrinkle when your toes twinkle? If you?re hoping to stave off the lingering scent of sweaty shoes, traditional Chinese green tea could be the answer to sweaty feet and their malodorous consequences. A student project at Singapore?s Temasek Junior College found that green tea ? a popular drink in Asia ? dribbled into the insoles of shoes reduced the stench caused by sweaty feet, Singapore?s Straits Times newspaper reported on Friday.

«We used tea as we heard it prevents micro-organisms from growing,» said Michelle Low, the project?s 16-year-old team leader whose group experimented with 10 types of tea leaves before settling on green tea.

Made from the steamed and dried leaves of the camellia sinesis plant ? a shrub native to Asia ? green tea has been known in Asia for centuries as a herbal disease-fighter, mainly because of its natural chemicals known as polyphenols which have antioxidant properties.