What keeps nanopores boiling

Abstract

The liquid to vapour transition can occur at unexpected conditions in nanopores, opening the door to fundamental questions and new technologies. The physics of boiling in confinement is progressively introduced, starting from classical nucleation theory, passing through nanoscale effects, and terminating to the material and external parameters which affect the boiling conditions. The relevance of boiling in specific nanoconfined systems is discussed, focusing on heterogeneous lyophobic systems, chromatographic columns, and ion channels. The current level of control of boiling in nanopores enabled by microporous materials, as metal organic frameworks, and biological nanopores paves the way to thrilling theoretical challenges and to new technological opportunities in the fields of energy, neuromorphic computing, and sensing.

References in corpus (8)

• Mechanical Metamaterials with Negative Compressibility Transitions
• Fluids at the Nanoscale: from continuum to sub-continuum transport
• Soft matter in hard confinement: phase transition thermodynamics, structure, texture, diffusion and flow in nanoporous media - topical review
• Conceptual aspects of line tensions
• Nanofluidics at the crossroads
• Wetting and cavitation pathways on nanodecorated surfaces
• Cavitation nuclei regeneration in water-particle suspension
• An atomistically informed multiscale approach to the intrusion and extrusion of water in hydrophobic nanopores