People in many densely populated, poor countries constantly struggle with access to clean drinking water. Standard disinfection methods are expensive and sometimes ineffective. Scientists have developed a new technology that allows using sunlight and a simple sheet of aluminum to clean even the most dirty and unfit for drinking liquid.
The new technique is based on ultrashort laser pulses, which make it possible to turn the surface of an ordinary aluminum sheet into super absorbent and super absorbent material. After the aluminum plate is placed in water at an angle to the sun, it begins to attract a thin layer of water up the metal surface.
Since the material retains almost 100% of the energy received from the sun, the water heats up quickly. At the same time, during the evaporation process, changes in the intermolecular bonds of the liquid occur, which makes it possible to increase the efficiency of the evaporation process. According to researchers, this method will be much more effective than conventional boiling, contributing to the destruction of microbial pathogens and reduce mortality from intestinal infections.
Experiments have proven that the new technique allows you to purify water from detergents, dyes, heavy metals and glycerin. One of the advantages of the technology is the flexibility of adjusting the angle of the aluminum evaporator, which allows you to clean much more water, maximizing the absorption of solar energy.
Researchers have not reported anything about plans to commercialize the technology.