Solar-driven surface-heating membrane distillation using TiCT MXene-coated spacers.

The emergence of two-dimensional (2D) MXenes as efficient light-to-heat conversion materials offers significant potential for solar-based desalination, particularly in photothermal interfacial evaporation, enabling cost-effective solar-powered membrane distillation (MD). This study investigates solar-powered MD afforded by a photothermally functionalized spacer, which is built by spray-coating TiCT MXene sheets on metallic spacers. 2D TiCT MXene gives an ultrahigh photothermal conversion efficiency; thereby, by TiCT MXene-coated metallic spacer, this rationally designed spacer allows for a localized photothermal conversion and interfacial feed heating effect on the membrane surface, especially for MD operation.