Passive cathodic water/air management device for micro-direct methanol fuel cells

A high efficient passive water/air management device (WAMD) is proposed and successfully demonstrated in this paper. The apparatus consists of cornered micro-channels and air-breathing windows with hydrophobicity arrangement to regulate liquids and gases to flow on their predetermined pathways. A high performance water/air separation with water removal rate of about 5.1 μl s^-1 cm^-2 is demonstrated. The performance of the proposed WAMD is sufficient to manage a cathode-generated water flux of 0.26 μl s ^-1 cm^-2 in the micro-direct methanol fuel cells (μDMFCs) which are operated at 100 mW cm^-2 or 400 mA cm ^-2. Furthermore, the condensed vapors can also be collected and recirculated with the existing micro-channels which act as a passive water recycling system for μDMFCs. The durability testing shows that the fuel cells equipped with WAMD exhibit improved stability and higher current density. © 2010 Elsevier B.V.