Effect of dimethyl carbonate on the behavior of water confined in carbon nanotube

Abstract

The dehydration of water by dimethyl carbonate (DMC) is of great significance for its application in electrochemistry and oil industry. With the rapid development of nanomaterial, one-dimensional (e.g. carbon nanotube (CNT)) and two-dimensional (e.g. lamellar graphene) materials have been widely used for molecular sieving. In this work, the molecular behavior of dimethyl carbonate/water mixture confined in CNT with varying diameters was studied based on molecular dynamics simulation. Due to different van der Waals interactions for the components in the mixtures with the solid surface, DMC molecules are preferentially adsorbed on the inner surface of the pore wall and formed an adsorption layer. Comparing with the pure water molecules confined in CNT, the adsorption DMC layer shows notable effect on the local compositions and microstructures of water molecules under nanoconfinement, which may result in different water mobility. Our analysis shows that the surface-induced DMC molecules can destroy the hydrogen bonding network of water molecules and result in an uniform and dispersed distribution of water molecules in the tube. These clear molecular understandings can be useful in material design for membrane separation.