Functionalized biomass-derived composites for solar vapor generation

In the case of water shortages and serious environmental pollution, it is urgent to find a clean way to produce clean water. In this work, we carbonized the radish, which is one of the most common biomass and the carbonized radish was proved hydrophilic, stable and suitable for solar vapor generation. Furthermore, when polystyrene was used as insulation material, the carbonized white radish with a thickness of 1 cm exhibited the best photothermal performance. In addition, when the carbonized radish was coated by titanium nitride and titanium oxide, the evaporation rate of the composite materials is the highest among all of materials we prepared. Compared to a pristine biomass carbon material, the composite material has a synergistic effect, which significantly improved the photothermal efficiency. The device composed of carbonized biomass with titanium nitride reached 72% efficiency under one 1sun, and with an evaporation of 1.18 kg m(-2) h(-1).