Fig. 4: Solar steam generation properties of microstructured PVA/PPy gel membranes.
From: All-day fresh water harvesting by microstructured hydrogel membranes
a Water loss for different membrane shapes under 1 sun, with free water as control. b Evaporation rate and energy efficiency for different tested micro-topologies. c Light absorption spectra over wavelengths of 250–2500 nm of gel membranes with different micro-topologies. The small jump of the curves at wavelength ~900 nm is caused by the switch of detectors. d Surface temperature contours (left) and illuminated pattern (right) for different micro-topologies under normal 1 sun illumination, simulated using COMSOL. e Measured surface temperature as a function of time at four positions along the height of a typical gel micro-tree.
