Preparation and Application of Hydrogel Materials for Interfacial Solar Vapor Generation

Mankind has great a demand for water resources in daily life. There has been an increasing focus on extracting purified water or irrigable water from seawater or sewage sources. Solar interfacial evaporation technology is considered a promising approach due to its strong operability, high solar thermal conversion efficiency, and environmentally friendly characteristics. These advantages make it as one of the best ways to improve water quality of seawater or sewage. To enhance the efficiency of solar interface evaporation, a variety of materials are employed to applied to efficient photothermal conversion and higher evaporation rates. Among these materials, hydrogel stands out as an innovative platform for achieving high evaporation efficiency. In this review, hydrogel materials are firstly introduced, including non-covalent cross-linked hydrogels and covalent cross-linked hydrogels for solar interface evaporation. Subsequently, the application of hydrogel materials in solar interface evaporation is discussed, followed by a summary of the potential future development of solar interface evaporation technology based on hydrogel materials.