As parts of the world face ongoing water shortages, a groundbreaking new device that turns hot air into drinkable water could help solve the problem.
As explained by Tech Xplore, researchers at the University of Texas at Austin published their results in September 2023 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, revealing that they have “made a significant advance in efforts to create drinking water from thin air: They can create clean water using only energy from sunlight.” molecularly engineered hydrogel.
Researchers have successfully extracted water from the atmosphere using solar energy at temperatures as low as 104 degrees, typical of summer weather in Texas and other parts of the world. US cities like Flint, Michigan have long faced a crisis of lack of access to clean drinking water. In Ethiopia, 60% of the population does not have basic access to clean water.
Tech Xplore noted that the device “can produce between 3.5 and 7 kilograms (0.91 and 1.82 gallons) of water per kilogram of gel material, depending on humidity conditions.”
In other words, a simple device could someday be placed outside the homes of people living in extremely hot areas and produce potable water without much effort.
“With our new hydrogel, we’re not just pulling water out of the air. We do this extremely quickly and without using a lot of energy,” said Guihua Yu, professor of materials science and engineering at the Cockrell School of Engineering’s Walker Mechanical Engineering and Texas Materials Institute.
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Yu continued, “What’s really interesting about our hydrogel is how it releases water. Think about a hot Texas summer – we can just take advantage of the natural ebb and flow of our temperature, no need to turn on any heaters.
The hydrogel is particularly capable of breaking down into “microgels,” facilitating the speed and efficiency improvements needed to bring the device closer to reality.
“By transforming the hydrogel into micro-sized particles, we can enable water capture and ultrafast release,” said Weixin Guan, a graduate student in Yu’s lab and one of the leaders of the study. “This suggests new, highly effective sorbents that can significantly increase water production with a few days of cycling.”
The next step in turning the device into a commercial product is for the researchers to scale up production.
Increasing the engineering of microgels will further increase efficiency. The research team is also developing other versions of the device made from organic materials that would make mass production more cost-effective.
“We designed this device to be accessible to people around the world who need quick and consistent access to clean, potable water, especially in arid areas,” says Yaxuan Zhao, a graduate student in Yu’s lab.
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