Photosynthesis in the service of man

Researchers at the Technion have developed a technology to produce energy from succulent plants

Researchers at the Technion have developed a technology to produce energy from fleshy leaves. This process, energetically based on the plant's natural photosynthesis, has many advantages including:

1. The electric current produced increases both in the light and in the dark.
2. The production of the energy does not require the separation of the leaf from the plant.
3. In this process, carbon dioxide is absorbed from the atmosphere while the plant is growing.
4. The current generated in the process can be directed directly to the emission of hydrogen that may be used as a clean fuel.

The research, which was conducted with the support of the Grand Energy Program (GTEP) at the Technion, was conducted by Prof. Noam Adir from the Shulich Faculty of Chemistry, Prof. Gadi Schuster from the Biology Faculty and PhD student Yaniv Schlossberg. They present the technology they developed in an article in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces. The succulent used in this study is the "ice plant" (Corpuscularia lehmannii). The researchers inserted an iron anode and a platinum cathode into the leaf of this plant and thus produced a continuous electric current that, as mentioned above, increases over time. Succulents are plants that have developed during evolution an impressive resistance to changes in temperature, water availability and other variables, partly through water storage inside the leaf and self-repair mechanisms of the surface of the leaf exposed to the outside world.

According to the researchers, harvesting energy from biological systems that perform photosynthesis is usually done by Immersion of the system in an electrolytic solution; However, the current research shows that in succulent plants there is no need for such an artificial solution thanks to the sap found in the leaf itself. This advantage eliminates the need to detach the leaves from the plant. 

For article B- ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces

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