Facile preparation of Janus polymer film and application in alleviating water crisis

Water scarcity has been becoming a global water crisis, which has threatened the sustainable development of world economic. In this contribution, it will be reported that Janus polymer film can help us coping with this water crisis through water collection and water evaporation suppressing. A sodium maleate grafted polypropylene (PP-g-NaMA) film was fabricated by solvent induced self-assembly, which has one side hydrophobic and the other side superhydrophilic. In addition to low cost, high performance and excellent stability, the newly developed Janus film can be used for water evaporation reduction and water collection, both with very high efficiency. The durable film can also be recycled easily after using. It is unquestionable that the new finding reported in this paper provides a new avenue to alleviate the water crisis in the world.