Fig. 1.
a) View of the flat cell used for the desalination experiments: total area 40cm2, direct contact membrane distillation configuration (DCMD). The downstream side is shown here with a piece of a PVDF membrane in place. The cell was home-made using a transparent glassy material (PMMA) to help the visualization of the tangential flow and of the wetting phenomenon.
b) A drop a water was deposed on the membrane: the spherical shape of the drop is due to the hydrophobic property of the membrane surface (contact angle: 125°).