How did Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin enhance the practice of slavery?

Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin in 1793 significantly enhanced the practice of slavery by dramatically increasing the efficiency of cotton processing. This machine allowed a single worker to clean as much cotton in one hour as it previously took a team of laborers an entire day to accomplish. As cotton became a highly profitable cash crop in the Southern United States, demand for slave labor surged to cultivate and harvest the cotton, leading to an expansion of the plantation system and the entrenchment of slavery in the region. Consequently, the cotton gin inadvertently reinforced and intensified the economic reliance on enslaved labor in the South.