Enhancement of Water Evaporation on Solid Surfaces with Nanoscale Hydrophobic-Hydrophilic Patterns

Using molecular dynamics simulations, we show that the evaporation of nanoscale water on hydrophobic-hydrophilic patterned surfaces is unexpectedly faster than that on any surfaces with uniform wettability. The key to this phenomenon is that, on the patterned surface, the evaporation rate from the hydrophilic region only slightly decreases due to the correspondingly increased water thickness; meanwhile, a considerable number of water molecules evaporate from the hydrophobic region despite the lack of water film. Most of the evaporated water from the hydrophobic region originates from the hydrophilic region by diffusing across the contact lines. Further analysis shows that the evaporation rate from the hydrophobic region is approximately proportional to the total length of the contact lines.