Journal Article

Nature‐inspired 3D hierarchical carbon nanotube matrices enable extraordinary solar steam generation

Lin, Weiquan, Zhang, Lizhi, Liu, Huan, Qi, Ronghui, Chen, Lei, Li, Zipai, Dong, Chuanshuai, Lu, Lin, Peng, Chaohua, Wei, Linjie

2025

Overview

Interfacial solar evaporation, which captures solar energy and localizes the absorbed heat for water evaporation, is considered a promising technology for seawater desalination and solar energy conversion. However, it is currently limited by its low photothermal conversion efficiency, salt accumulation, and poor reliability. Herein, inspired by human intestinal villi structure, we design and fabricate a novel intestinal villi‐like nitrogen‐doped carbon nanotubes solar steam generator (N‐CNTs SSG) consisting of three‐dimensional (3D) hierarchical carbon nanotube matrices for ultrahigh solar evaporation efficiency. The 3D matrices with radial direction nitrogen‐doped carbon nanotube clusters achieve ultrahigh surface area, photothermal efficiency, and hydrophilicity, which significantly intensifies the whole interfacial solar evaporation process. The new solar evaporation efficiency reaches as high as 96.8%. Furthermore, our ab initio molecular dynamics simulation reveals that N‐doped carbon nanotubes exhibit a greater number of electronic states in close proximity to the Fermi level when compared to pristine carbon nanotubes. The outstanding absorptivity in the full solar spectrum and high solar altitude angles of the 3D hierarchical carbon nanotube matrices offer great potential to enable ultrahigh photothermal conversion under all‐day and all‐season circumstances. Inspired by the intestinal villi structure and quasi‐blackbody feature of nitrogen‐doped carbon nanotubes, a novel intestinal villi‐like nitrogen‐doped carbon nanotubes solar steam generator (N‐CNTs SSG) was designed and fabricated. Benefitting from the multi‐reflection and diffuse reflection, the novel N‐CNTs SSG achieves multi‐angle all‐weather sunlight absorption and unprecedentedly high solar evaporation efficiency of 96.8%.

• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc,Wiley
• Subject: Absorptivity / Boilers / Carbon / Carbon nanotubes / Chemical vapor deposition / Cobalt / Contact angle / Desalination / Efficiency / Electron states / Energy conversion / Evaporation / fermi level / Heat / interfacial solar evaporation / Intestine / Molecular dynamics / Nanoparticles / Nanotechnology / Nanotubes / Nitrates / Nitrogen / nitrogen‐doped carbon nanotubes / Phase transitions / Photothermal conversion / Radiation / Scanning electron microscopy / Seawater / Solar energy / Solar energy conversion / Spectrum analysis / Steam generation / Water transportation