Post date: Jan 10, 2017 9:19:18 PM
Together with experimental colleagues from ILM and Seoul, Laurent has published an article entitled "Nanoscale Dynamics versus Surface Interactions: What Dictates Osmotic Transport?" in The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters.
Osmotic effects refer to liquid (often water) flow between two regions with different salinity, driven by the presence of interfaces. Usually, these interfaces correspond to the walls of a porous medium – a membrane – connecting two liquid reservoirs. Osmotic effects play a key role in living systems, in sustainable energies (with for instance the “blue energy” systems), or in water treatment and desalination processes.
Combining nanofluidic experiments and simulations at the atomic scale, the authors show that the standard description based on liquid-wall interactions can fail to describe the mere direction of osmotic flows, and they highlight the crucial role of the interfacial liquid dynamics. This better microscopic knowledge of osmotic effects paves the way for the development of new functionalities or for the optimization of performance in various fields going from sustainable energies to active matter.