Question

What happens to the water when wet clothes dry?

Answer 1

Hint: Students must remember the process of evaporation. When kept in sunlight, the water molecules within the clothes are excited and they get evaporated and the water vapour goes into the atmosphere.

Complete step by step solution:
Evaporation is a process in which liquid changes its state to gas or vapour. It is the process which is responsible for water changing its state from liquid to water vapour and hence moving back to the water cycle.
When clothes are kept in sunlight and are allowed to dry, due to the heat of the sun the clothes become warm as a result of which the temperature of water in the cloth increases, and due to this increase in temperature, the kinetic energy of the water molecules increases as a result of which the molecules evaporates and leave into the atmosphere and thereby making the clothes dry.
As a matter of fact, the water molecules which leave the cloth and move into the atmosphere again hit and get into the cloth. When the weather is less humid, the number of water molecules escaping from the cloth is far higher than the ones that get into the cloth. So, when the clothes are allowed to dry in wind, the water molecules, after they move into the air and as they try to get into the cloth again, they are removed from the vicinity of the cloth by the wind and thereby reducing the concentration of water molecules in the vicinity of the cloth. As a result, the wet clothes may also be dried under wind but will take a longer time as compared to clothes drying under sunlight.

Note: Evaporation of water molecules from the clothes can take place not only in the presence of sunlight, but can even take place if the velocity of the wind is higher and the atmosphere possesses less moisture content.