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Salt marsh microbes for hydrogen energy

31.07.2013

In the highly saline waters of saline lakes, special microorganisms, halobacteria, live, which give the lakes a specific pink color. As it turned out, the protein contained in the membranes of halobacteria can revolutionize the production of hydrogen fuel.

Scientists at the US Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory have come up with a new way to use sunlight to create clean hydrogen fuel. The study's lead author is Elena Rozhkova, a nanotechnology specialist who works for the US Department of Energy. The main goal of this work is to send oil to the back of history as the main source of fuel for modern transport.

It is possible that halobacteria can help in the production of cheap hydrogen fuel, at least experiments indicate such a possibility. Elena Rozhkova and her colleagues were able to combine the bacterial pigment bacteriorhodopsin with semiconductor nanoparticles of titanium dioxide and platinum. The result is a complex that can act as a catalyst in the production of hydrogen.

Scientists have previously been aware of the great potential of titanium dioxide nanoparticles in alternative energy. So, back in 1970, Japanese scientists discovered that a titanium dioxide electrode in bright ultraviolet light is able to separate water molecules and thus produce hydrogen. This phenomenon is known as the Honda-Fujishima effect. Since then, scientists have made great efforts to commercialize this technology, but, unfortunately, titanium dioxide only reacts with ultraviolet light, as a result of which most of the sunlight is not used to produce hydrogen.

Scientists decided to fill this gap with the help of bacteriorhodopsin, which can act as a proton pump and, together with nanoparticles, creates a hybrid circuit that effectively uses maximum sunlight to produce hydrogen.
The proton pump is based on proteins that naturally vibrate the cell membrane and transfer protons from inside the cell to the extracellular space. In the new setup, protons supplied by bacteriorhodopsin interact with free electrons on small patches of platinum located in a titanium dioxide matrix. When this structure is taught by sunlight, hydrogen molecules are formed on platinum nanoparticles.

The new "biohybrid" photocatalyst outperforms most other similar hydrogen production systems and could become a commercially viable source of clean fuel. At the same time, all the raw materials that will be needed to produce hydrogen are salty sea water and sunlight. Later, the burnt hydrogen will again turn into water, fall out as rain or snow, and the cycle of the raw material/fuel cycle will repeat.

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