14 DAY TRIAL // At the 241st national meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS), held in Anaheim, California, between March 27-31, experts presented the first functional, efficient artificial leaf. The device is capable of converting sunlight and water into electricity.
It works by mimicking an artificial process called photosynthesis, which is omnipresent in vegetation. All plants use it to convert water and carbon dioxide they extract from the atmosphere into oxygen and energy, in the presence of solar light.
Mimicking this process at usable levels of efficiency was a long-term goal of science, because it would finally allow researchers to be set on an affordable path towards creating sustainable, renewable energy sources that can be used in bulk at low cost.
At the conference, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) presented an artificial solar cell that was about the size of a poker card. The device is capable of replicating photosynthesis with extreme efficiency, its creators say.
“A practical artificial leaf has been one of the Holy Grails of science for decades. We believe we have done it,” said MIT expert Daniel Nocera, PhD, the leader of the research team, at the conference.
“The artificial leaf shows particular promise as an inexpensive source of electricity for homes of the poor in developing countries. Our goal is to make each home its own power station,” he added.
“One can envision villages in India and Africa not long from now purchasing an affordable basic power system based on this technology,” the MIT scientist went on to say.
The artificial leaf – which represents the next step in solar cell technologies – is made up of silicon, electronics and catalysts, and is even thinner than a poker card. When placed inside a gallon of water under the sunny sky, the instrument can produce sufficient electricity for a household's daily needs.
It's basic mechanism of action is splitting water into its two primary components, hydrogen and oxygen, which then go on to be stored inside fuel cells. They can later be used for energy production or even other applications.
Experts with the Boulder, Colorado-based US National Renewable Energy Laboratory made the first artificial leaf more than 10 years ago, but their device could only last for a day, and included expensive materials that made it economically unfeasible to produce.
The innovation Nocera and his team achieved was building their device from inexpensive, widely-available materials, in a manner that enables it to be reused multiple times. The MIT artificial leaf can operate for more than 45 hours without becoming unstable.
“Nature is powered by photosynthesis, and I think that the future world will be powered by photosynthesis as well in the form of this artificial leaf,” explained Nocera.
His study was funded by the US National Science Foundation and the Chesonis Family Foundation.