In drought prone areas and other regions without potable water, sustenance of life becomes challenging. To address this problem, it is critical to develop novel materials and methodologies for harvesting atmospheric water. Furthermore, for effective moisture collection the materials need to be thermally responsive, in order to switch between moisture absorbing and moisture releasing at low temperatures (between 40 and 50°C). One promising category of materials for effective atmospheric water harvesting is polymer based, moisture absorbent hydrogels.<br/>In this research several moisture absorbent hydrogel were synthesized and their performances for atmospheric water harvesting were evaluated. The gels consisted of two main components, a water absorbent material, such as polypyrrole doped with chloride, and a polymeric network, such as poly N - isopropylacrylamide, for storing the absorbed water. The performance of the gels for capturing atmospheric water (measured as percent increase in mass over time) was evaluated at different temperature and relative humidity conditions. Furthermore, the performance of the gels over multiple cycles of absorption and desorption of water was evaluated. The results showed significant promise for real world atmospheric water harvesting to generate potable water.

Development of polymer gels for atmospheric water harvesting

ACS Spring 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.