Experimental Validation of Electric Field Effect on Capillary Condensation in Micron Deep Channels

Small scale systems has attracted significant attention due to different dominant forces, pressures and interaction effects in that scale. Capillary condensation is one of the unique phenomenon that happens in micro scale flows due to the presence of Laplace pressure below the saturation vapor pressure. Although there is a high usage of capillary condensation in different fields such as water purification, MEMs, and gas drying, it requires specific thermodynamic conditions and suffers from low flow rates. Thermodynamic simulations have suggested electric fields as one of the ways to tackle these drawbacks by inducing condensation in larger channels and lower relative humidity. To the best of our knowledge this effect hasn't been looked at experimentally due to difficulties to reach high electric fields and proper insulation. Here we propose a new experiment to validate this hypothesis. Here a 100% humid air flows through a micron deep channel with clear electrodes to the open air. The condensed water in the channel is then looked at with a self assembled spectrometer to better study the electric field effect. We will also discuss the developed thermodynamic model and this work's application in different fields such as vapor separation.