![]() So that actually temperature change will effectively release the water that you originally stored in the gel. So that HPC is actually very unique in terms of they are responsible to the thermal heat, meaning that if you have a mild temperature change, for example, if you have 80 at night– and then actually, when sun comes in to heat up your gel materials to about 95 Fahrenheit. So our magic materials that has the second ingredient, we call a Cellulose. So that’s actually you need to have external electricity to do that. So that– typically, we need to pay large energy penalty, meaning that you need to heat up that desiccant to release the water, so going through this evaporation, condensation. ![]() So it’s very hard for them to release the water back to be useful. So you can imagine, right? So in our daily life, the desiccants can do the job of dehumidifing our ambient air but really, after water absorption. So another ingredient that we designed doing also the other function is for water release. So this actually can be very efficient in terms of absorbing the water vapor and then store it in their network. So we have this one polymer, So you can actually find them actually very commonly in kitchens, especially in Asia. Hygroscopic means you can absorb water vapor. One of them is doing a function of water harvesting in terms of the hygroscopic property. So this actually magic material have two chemical ingredients. So hydrogel means– by a scientific term, it’s kind of a polymer, this highly cross-link. So we actually have been working on designing these soft materials. IRA FLATOW: What’s that old phrase, any significantly advanced technology’s equivalent to magic? I mean, is this magic? Tell us about this material? GUIHUA YU: Thank you so much for having me, Ira. And they describe some of its performance in research published in the journal Nature Communications. And his group has developed a material that can literally pull water out of air and as I say, even from desert air. He works with the Texas Materials Institute and the UT Energy Institute. Guihua Yu, Professor of Materials Science and Mechanical and Engineering at UT Austin. Well, a group of engineers at the University of Texas at Austin claims to be able to do that. You know the old magic trick of pulling a playing card out of thin air? Well, what if you could do that with water, pull it out of thin air efficiently, and even from dry desert air? Given the critical water shortages we’re facing and threatening to get worse in our climate crisis, that would be some trick, wouldn’t it? ![]() Read the paper, via Nature Communications.Guihua Yu, a professor of materials science and mechanical engineering at UT Austin and one of the authors of the report, joins Ira to talk about the material, its applications, and what challenges remain before it can be put into widespread use. So at lower temperatures, the team’s polymer film absorbs water, but can rapidly release that water when the film is heated by the sun or artificial heating.ĭr. (In scientific terms, it’s a “hygroscopic material.”) The second ingredient, hydroxypropyl cellulose, responds dramatically to changes in temperature. First, a konjac gum, which can be found in Asian cooking, rapidly absorbs water from the air. The material itself contains two main ingredients. Carefully applied materials science and engineering allows the team to extract as much as six liters of water per day from one kilogram of their polymer, even in areas with 15% humidity. Writing in the journal Nature Communications, researchers at UT Austin describe an experiment where they seem to pull water out of dry air-but it’s not magic, and it’s not a trick. You’ve probably seen a magic trick in which a performer makes a playing card, coin, or even a rabbit appear out of thin air. A diagram and a photograph of the water collection device.
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