Liquid Fuel Harvested From Environmental "Bionic Leaf' Fused With Solar-sucking Bacteria in Engineering Breakthrough

A team of scientists from the Harvard Medical School and the Wyss Institute for Biological Inspired Engineering have designed a bionic leaf that has the ability to convert solar energy into liquid fuel. The artificial leaf with the help of a catalyst, works by splitting solar energy into oxygen and hydrogen. The device also contains a bacterium, which is engineered to convert hydrogen and carbon dioxide atoms into isopropanol - a type of liquid fuel.

While plants mastered the technique of photosynthesis more than a billion years ago, scientists have been figuring out ways to derive energy from renewable sources. Harnessing solar energy has for long, been a popular idea with scientists looking to provide clean energy fuel. But the ability of the photovoltaic cells in solar equipment is not a practical option for large scale power generation or to be used as fuel in cars for driving. Considering the world we designed for ourselves still revolves around the use of liquid fuel, the bionic leaf technology may possibly have a critical role to play in the future.

Daniel Nocera, one of the members of the team spoke about how they used readily available and inexpensive materials as catalysts for their device. He said, "The catalysts I made are extremely well adapted and compatible with the growth conditions you need for living organisms like a bacterium."

Their next goal is to improve the bionic leafs rate of efficiency by 5 per cent so that it can convert solar energy into biomass. Pamela Silver and Daniel Nocera began work on the project 2 years ago and the team's findings was recently published in PNAS.

Nocera said, "We're almost at a 1 percent efficiency rate of converting sunlight into isopropanol. There have been 2.6 billion years of evolution, and Pam and I working together a year and a half have already achieved the efficiency of photosynthesis."