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CATEGORIES:Institute for Energy and Environmental Flows (IEEF
 )
SUMMARY:Molecular Photosynthesis: Such Stuff as Dreams are
  Made On - Marcella Bonchio University of Padova a
 nd ITM-CNR
DTSTART;TZID=Europe/London:20190124T113000
DTEND;TZID=Europe/London:20190124T123000
UID:TALK117454AThttp://talks.cam.ac.uk
URL:http://talks.cam.ac.uk/talk/index/117454
DESCRIPTION:The use of solar-activated H2O/CO2 routines as a f
 eed-stock for photosynthetic processes is nowadays
  a breakthrough concept for sustainable energy\, s
 olar fuels\, green chemistry and food security. Th
 e enormous potential of this vital cycle is far fr
 om being adequately exploited. Indeed\, Natural Ph
 otosynthesis will not be adequate to feed the worl
 d and power its energy needs in the next decades. 
 As a result of a population increase up to 9 billi
 on people\, the global demand for food and energy 
 will increase more than 60% by 2050. In this time-
 frame\, a spontaneous\, evolutionary burst of the 
 Natural Machinery is out of reach. \n\nThe game-ch
 anger relies on a man-made re-design of photosynth
 esis to overcome the natural bottlenecks\, efficie
 ncy losses\, and govern land exploitation conflict
 s for food and energy (bio-fuels) production. The 
 urgency is such that we need to accelerate the equ
 ivalent of 100 million years evolution to orders o
 f magnitude less contingency.\n\nResearch on Artif
 icial Photosynthesis is taking the risk of this re
 volution\, by focussing on the high-gain of a sust
 ainable\, clean and secure future “….the guarded s
 ecret of the plants\, mastered by human industry w
 hich will know how to make them bear even more abu
 ndant fruit than nature\, for Nature is not in a h
 urry and mankind is” (Giacomo Ciamician “The photo
 chemistry of the future” Science 1912\, 36\, 385-3
 94).\nAn extraordinary research effort has been de
 dicated to elucidate the structural and mechanisti
 c prerogatives of the natural oxygen evolving comp
 lex embedded within the photosystem II enzyme (PSI
 I-OEC). A recent breakthrough in the field of arti
 ficial photosynthesis is the discovery of syntheti
 c multi-redox catalysts\, as analogs of the PSII-O
 EC (Scheme 1)\, with a common functional-motif\, i
 .e. a redox-active\, tetranuclear {M4(-O)4 core 
 boosting H2O oxidation to O2 with unprecedented ef
 ficiency. Our vision points to a careful choice/de
 sign of the catalytic core\, of its ligand set and
  of the surrounding nano-environment. We report he
 rein a combined synthetic\, spectroscopic and mech
 anistic study on the use multi-metal catalysts for
  water oxidation and their combined use with visib
 le light sensitizers and carbon nanostructures (CN
 S). The outcome is a hybrid nanomaterial with unpe
 rturbed CNS electrical properties\, enabling water
  splitting with high efficiency at overpotentials 
 as low as the natural protein.\n
LOCATION:Open Plan Area\, BP Institute\, Madingley Rise CB3
  0EZ
CONTACT:Catherine Pearson
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