Surviving in a desert or a draught is often a matter of finding usable water. Some plants and animals have evolved the ability to extract water from the humidity of the atmosphere, and scientists have been working on ways we can do it, too. A new development in the process of moisture farming is a dehydrated gel made from inexpensive materials: plant cellulose and lithium chloride. The materials were combined, left to set, then freeze-dried. A thin sheet of the dried gel extracted water from air containing as little as 15% humidity. To take the water from the gel, it only had to be heated to 140°F, much lower than other moisture-extracting materials.
So far, only small amounts of this gel have been tested, but if can be replicated at scale, one kilogram of the material would extract six liters of water at 15% relative humidity and more than 13 liters of water at 30% humidity. The air in the Mojave desert is usually at between 10% and 30% humidity. Even better, the ingredients of a kilogram of the gel only cost about $2. At larger volumes, the trick would be to keep it super-thin, which would require a matrix and take up quite a bit of room. Read more about this development at Gizmodo.
(Image credit: Rennett Stowe)
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