Solar steam generation (SSG) is promising for clean water production owing to low cost, simple operation, and green technology. This work investigates the fabrication of bioinspired photothermal (BIPT) material by sputtering a copper layer on Phanera purpurea (PP) leaf for application in SSG systems. It is observed that the light absorbance of the BIPT material exceeds 92% in the wavelength region of 300–2500 nm. This is due to the light trapping effect caused by multi‐internal reflection inside the Cu‐coated leaf nanostructure. The BIPT material exhibits a low thermal conductivity and easy cleaning properties as a result of PP leaf surface features. A novel strategy in this work is the design of the BIPT material‐based SSG system to recycle the radiative heat loss for evaporation. The developed SSG system results in a solar steam efficiency of 83.7% and a water evaporation rate of 1.45 kg m−2 h−1 under 1 sun. It is also applied in seawater desalination and the produced water satisfies the WHO standards for ion concentrations in clean water. Because of the simple procedure and low cost, the sputtering Cu on the PP leaf can be potentially used in the mass production of BIPT material for seawater desalination.
The metal–insulator–metal (MIM) nanostructures on polystyrene sphere (PS) were fabricated by the sputtering method. Asymmetric PS-MIM nanocrescent (AMNC) was separated and dispersed into the solution employing the sonication method. The absorption properties of AMNC colloidal solution were measured and calculated with the use of spectroscopy and discrete dipole approximation methods. The results indicated that hybridization of elementary plasmons of individual AMNC particles played an important role in determining optical properties of this colloidal solution, which were determined to be functions of component layer thickness and particle density. These findings are expected to enhance the pharmaceutical deliveries and biosensor fabrication.
& tien thanh pham 1* in this work, two copper-based biometamaterials were engineered using leaves of water cabbage (Pistia stratiotes) and purple bauhinia (Phanera purpurea) as templates. the copper sputtering was implemented to produce a thin copper film on the surface of leaves. The scanning electron microscopy (SeM) images exhibited the root hair-like nanostructure of water cabbage leaf and single comb-like nanostructure of purple bauhinia leaf. in spite of copper coating, the leaf surfaces of water cabbage and purple bauhinia were black and exhibited excellent light absorption at visible and near infrarrred wavelengths. It was estimated that these two types of leaves could absorb roughly 90% of light. Finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) calculations predicted the low reflectance stemming from the leaf nanostructures and copper coating layer. Because of the low cost of copper as a coating metal and simple procedure, this can be a promising method for quick fabrication of a thin copper film on the leaf nanostructure for application in blackbody or as the light absorbers.
The insulator-metal-insulator (IMI) structure is potential for the fabrication of biosensor platform devices because of its unique optical properties, especially surface plasmon resonance (SPR). In this study, the optical properties of the IMI structure in the visible wavelength range were calculated using the transfer matrix method. The results indicated that the IMI structure exhibited high absorbance at the proper wavelength due to the SPR. This phenomenon was resulted from the resonance of incident light and the free electrons in the metal surface. The SPR signal relied on the thickness of layers in the IMI structure and the refractive index of the surrounding medium. Based on calculation results, the IMI structure applied for the biosensor was designed and optimised with respects to optical properties. In addition, sensitivity calculation demonstrated that IMI structure was more sensitive than biosensor based on attenuated total reflection (ATR), SPR method while similar results were attained with the metal-insulator-metal (MIM) structure method.
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