New crystal can harvest water from the air without inputting energy

A team of researchers from Jilin University, New York University Abu Dhabi’s Smart Materials Lab, and the Center for Smart Engineering Materials, led by chemistry professor Pans Naumov, has developed a new crystalline material that can harvest water from fog without inputting energy.

The design of this new type of smart crystal, which researchers have dubbed Janus crystals, is inspired by desert plants and animals that can survive in arid environments. For example, desert beetles and lizards have evolved surface structures that contain both hydrophilic and hydrophobic regions and effectively trap moisture from the air. Water is attracted to the hydrophilic regions, and droplets accumulate and are transported through the hydrophobic regions.

The results of this research were recently published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society in a paper titled “Efficient airborne water harvesting with self-sensing dynamic Janus crystals.”

The researchers selected three chemically versatile organic compounds for growing elastic organic crystals. They then tested how each of these materials interacted with water in the air. This led to the creation of Janus crystals, a new water-harvesting material that contains both hydrophilic and hydrophobic regions at the surface level, one that traps water and one that transports water. Transfer to a container for collection.

Janus Crystals capture moisture from humid air with the highest water collection efficiency ever. The crystal’s narrow, optically translucent structure allows researchers to use light to monitor the collection and condensation of fog droplets in real time.

Desalination is a widely used method for producing drinking water, but separating salts dissolved in brine requires an energy-intensive process. In contrast, the condensation process of atmospheric humidity and fog utilized by Janus crystals occurs spontaneously under ambient conditions and can be performed without inputting energy, potentially providing an endless source of clean water. there is.

Unlike previously reported porous organic crystals, Janus crystals combine water collection and water delivery functions on their surfaces, resulting in high efficiency that maximizes the amount of water collected at ambient conditions. water collection process.

“Earth’s atmosphere is rich in untapped freshwater, but we desperately need materials that can efficiently capture and collect this moisture and condense it into drinking water,” Naumov said. .

“The crystals developed by our team not only take advantage of the mechanical compliance and optical transparency of organic crystals, but also enable the design of efficient surface-active harvesters that are active and self-sensing when used at scale. It will help fight water scarcity at a societal level.”