posted on 2024-01-19, 17:45authored byLuis Bartolomé, Argyrios Anagnostopoulos, Alexander R. Lowe, Piotr Ślęczkowski, Eder Amayuelas, Andrea Le Donne, Michał Wasiak, Mirosław Chora̧żewski, Simone Meloni, Yaroslav Grosu
Heat and the work of compression/decompression are among
the basic
properties of thermodynamic systems. Being relevant to many industrial
and natural processes, this thermomechanical energy is challenging
to tune due to fundamental boundaries for simple fluids. Here via
direct experimental and atomistic observations, we demonstrate, for
fluids consisting of nanoporous material and a liquid, one can overcome
these limitations and noticeably affect both thermal and mechanical
energies of compression/decompression exploiting preferential intrusion
of water from aqueous solutions into subnanometer pores. We hypothesize
that this effect is due to the enthalpy of dilution manifesting itself
as the aqueous solution concentrates upon the preferential intrusion
of pure water into pores. We suggest this genuinely subnanoscale phenomenon
can be potentially a strategy for controlling the thermomechanical
energy of microporous liquids and tuning the wetting/dewetting heat
of nanopores relevant to a variety of natural and technological processes
spanning from biomedical applications to oil-extraction and renewable
energy.