A scalable fish-school inspired self-assembled particle system for solar-powered water-solute separation.

ABSTRACT: Complete separation of water and solute is the ultimate goal of water treatment, for maximized resource recycling. However, commercialized approaches such as evaporative crystallizers consume a large amount of electricity with a significant carbon footprint, leading to calls for alternative energy-efficient and eco-friendly strategies. Here, inspired by schooling fish, we demonstrate a collective system self-assembled by expanded polystyrene (EPS)-core/graphene oxide (GO)-shell particles, which enables autonomous, efficient and complete water-solute separation powered by sunlight. By taking advantage of surface tension, these tailored particles school together naturally and are bonded as a system to function collectively and coordinatively, to nucleate, grow and output salt crystals contin

SUBMITTER: Xu N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8566183 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature