Yangming Jiaotong University professor Xu Shiyi (second from right) and his laboratory team researched the desalination of seawater with the "amyloid protein" that causes Alzheimer's disease, and successfully published it in the international journal "Small".

(Provided by Yangming Jiaotong University)

[Reporter Lin Xiaoyun/Report from Taipei] Affected by extreme weather, Taiwan has faced a water shortage crisis in recent years, and seawater desalination has become another way of "water creation".

Xu Shiyi, a professor at the Institute of Life Sciences and Genome Sciences of Yangming Jiaotong University, chaired a research paper published in the international academic journal "Small". Scientists used the property of "amyloid protein that can block salt ions" that causes Alzheimer's disease to transport water molecules , to achieve the magical effect of 100% desalination of seawater, and develop a method for desalination of seawater.

Xu Shiyi explained that amyloid is an insoluble fibrous protein, and abnormal accumulation in body organs can cause serious diseases, the most famous being Alzheimer's disease.

The medical community hopes to find a way to clear the accumulation of amyloid in the brain to treat Alzheimer's disease.

But scientists went in the opposite direction and developed a method for desalination of seawater by using the properties of amyloid that can block salt ions.

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This method uses three amyloid-like nanotubes, which cleverly use the potential difference on the surface of the protein film to push water molecules to move in a single direction, while at the same time blocking the passage of salt ions—such as sodium Ions and chlorine ions - forming a self-contained "molecular motor" can achieve the effect of seawater desalination without any external energy supply.

Xu Shiyi said that the reverse osmosis method is currently the mainstream seawater desalination technology. It needs to pressurize the seawater through the reverse osmosis membrane through the motor to separate the salt in the seawater.

The technology works, but it costs so much power and equipment that economies of scale cannot be achieved.

The way of using amyloid to filter seawater shows that a biomimetic nanomaterial can be used as a new direction for effective and energy-saving seawater desalination.

The research team theoretically estimated that a filter membrane composed of amyloid nanotubes of 10 × 10 square centimeters can filter and produce 2.5 tons of fresh water a day, which is 200 times that of the currently known reverse osmosis method.

Xu Shiyi said that the sheet-like structure formed by the amyloid protein can not only automatically guide water molecules, as long as one of the amino acids in the structure is changed to be charged and the hydrophilic potential energy of the nanotubes can be increased, the interaction between water molecules and salt ions can be improved. separation efficiency.

The experimental results will allow the scientific community to understand the automatic transport mechanism of biomimetic materials and an efficient and energy-saving method for desalination of seawater.

Xu Shiyi pointed out that climate change has exacerbated the crisis of water scarcity. This biomimetic nanomaterial not only demonstrates that the one-way diffusion of water molecules can occur on the surface of nanoscale proteins, but also contributes to the future development of high-yield, low-energy, and low-carbon emissions. The seawater desalination mechanism finds a new candidate material and a new research direction.

Yangming Jiaotong University's research on desalinating seawater with the "amyloid protein" that causes Alzheimer's disease was successfully published in the international journal "Small".

The picture shows a schematic diagram of seawater desalination.

(Provided by Yangming Jiaotong University)