{"id":120036,"date":"2020-11-25T13:00:01","date_gmt":"2020-11-25T10:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/research-creates-hydrogen-producing-living-droplets-paving-way-for-alternative-future-energy-source\/"},"modified":"2020-11-25T13:00:01","modified_gmt":"2020-11-25T10:00:01","slug":"research-creates-hydrogen-producing-living-droplets-paving-way-for-alternative-future-energy-source","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/research-creates-hydrogen-producing-living-droplets-paving-way-for-alternative-future-energy-source\/","title":{"rendered":"#Research creates hydrogen-producing living droplets, paving way for alternative future energy source"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Research creates hydrogen-producing living droplets, paving way for alternative future energy source<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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\n Electron microscopy image of a densely packed droplet of hydrogen-producing algal cells. Scale bar, 10 micrometres. Credit: Prof Xin Huang, Harbin Institute of Technology<\/a>
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Scientists have built tiny droplet-based microbial factories that produce hydrogen, instead of oxygen, when exposed to daylight in air.<\/p>\n


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The findings of the international research team based at the University of Bristol and Harbin Institute of Technology in China, are published today in Nature Communications<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Normally, algal cells fix carbon dioxide and produce oxygen by photosynthesis. The study used sugary droplets packed with living algal cells to generate hydrogen, rather than oxygen, by photosynthesis.<\/p>\n

Hydrogen is potentially a climate-neutral fuel, offering many possible uses as a future energy source. A major drawback is that making hydrogen involves using a lot of energy, so green alternatives are being sought and this discovery could provide an important step forward.<\/p>\n

The team, comprising Professor Stephen Mann and Dr. Mei Li from Bristol’s School of Chemistry together with Professor Xin Huang and colleagues at Harbin Institute of Technology in China, trapp<\/a>ed ten thousand or so algal cells in each droplet, which were then crammed together by osmotic compression. By burying the cells deep inside the droplets, oxygen levels fell to a level that switched on special enzymes called hydrogenases that hijacked the normal photosynthetic pathway to produce hydrogen. In this way, around a quarter of a million microbial factories, typically only one-tenth of a millimeter in size, could be prepared in one milliliter of water.<\/p>\n

To increase the level of hydrogen evolution, the team coated the living micro-reactors with a thin shell of bacteria, which were able to scavenge for oxygen and therefore increase the number of algal cells geared up for hydrogenase activity.<\/p>\n

Although still at an early stage, the work provides a step towards photobiological green energy development under natural aerobic conditions.<\/p>\n

Professor Stephen Mann, Co-Director of the Max Planck Bristol Centre for Minimal Biology at Bristol, said: “Using simple droplets as vectors for controlling algal cell organization and photosynthesis in synthetic micro-spaces offers a potentially environmentally benign approach to hydrogen production that we hope to develop in future work.”<\/p>\n

Professor Xin Huang at Harbin Institute of Technology added: “Our methodology is facile and should be capable of scale-up without impairing the viability of the living cells. It also seems flexible; for example, we recently captured large numbers of yeast cells in the droplets and used the microbial reactors for ethanol production.”<\/p>\n\n

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Biofriendly protocells pump up blood vessels\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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\n More information:<\/strong>
\n “Photosynthetic hydrogen production by droplet-based microbial micro-reactors under aerobic conditions” Nature Communications<\/i> (2020). DOI: 10.1038\/s41467-020-19823-5<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n
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\n University of Bristol
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Citation<\/strong>:
\n Research creates hydrogen-producing living droplets, paving way for alternative future energy source (2020, November 25)
\n retrieved 25 November 2020
\n from https:\/\/phys.org\/news<\/a>\/2020-11-hydrogen-producing-droplets-paving-alternative-future.html<\/p>\n

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