Bioinspired fibers with alternating wettability and elastic vibration: enhancing water harvesting

• A bioinspired fiber with alternating wettability and elastic vibration for improving the condensation efficiency and promoting the rapid removal of droplets. • The adsorption mechanism of droplets hanging in hydrophilic region to small water droplets in superhydrophobic region was used to promote the rapid growth and removal of droplet. • The water collection efficiency of the horizontal HL-SHB elastic fiber (L HL :L SHB = 2:3) with an efficiency of 5.349 × 10 4 g/m 2 /h, which is about 2.5 times that of hydrophilic elastic fiber. • The optimized HL-SHB network with a high water collection efficiency up to 9.8 × 10 4 g/m 2 /h, which is about 185 times that of the fiber-based composite mesh. The scarcity of freshwater resources significantly impacts both human life and wildlife survival. Atmospheric water collection technology, which harvests droplets from fog, has emerged as an effective strategy to mitigate water shortages in arid, inland regions. In this paper, a bionic elastic fiber with alternating hydrophilic and superhydrophobic properties is designed, which can adsorb droplets in the hydrophilic region and promote their rapid growth, and utilizes fiber rebound vibration to facilitate the removal of droplets. Results indicate that with a hydrophilic region length of 2 mm and a superhydrophobic region length of 3 mm, substantial water removal can be achieved, enabling fiber rebound and promoting rapid droplet removal. The water collection efficiency of the alternating hydrophilic and superhydrophobic elastic fibers can reach a maximum of approximately 5.3 × 10 4 g/m 2 /h. Furthermore, networks composed of hybrid wetting fibers facilitate droplet removal through jumping and sweeping removal methods, achieving a water collection efficiency of up to about 9.8 × 10 4 g/m 2 /h. These findings establish a foundation for the practical application of hybrid wetting fibers in atmospheric water collection.