Genetically engineered blood protein can split water into oxygen and hydrogen
Imperial College London is collaborating with Waseda University (Japan) professors Tsuchida and Komatsu on another potential way to produce hydrogen. They've engineered a new compound from two molecules that occur naturally in blood, to use solar energy to split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen. The researchers have combined a protein called albumin with porphyrin to create a molecular complex that can absorb light energy, to allow it to split up water molecules. Porphyrin is the molecule that carries oxygen around in the blood-stream. The albumin is genetically engineered to improve the efficiency of the whole process. Sooner or later scientists will find a process that allows for simple localized production of hydrogen. Since hydrogen is the most common element in the known universe, and obviously reacts and combines with so many other elements, there is bound to be a way to reverse the process efficiently.[Source: Imperial College London]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
y 2:31PM (12/03/2006)
i thought hemoglobin transports oxygen in the bloodstream?
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CM 8:16PM (12/03/2006)
Not too suprising. Chlorophyll is structurally similar to hemoglobin, both molecules are porphyrin ring structures. The major difference is hemoglobin has an iron atom at the center of the ring, chlorophyll has manganese at the center, instead. Plants use chlorophyll to split water, releasing the oxygen, and using the hydrogen to convert carbon dioxide into carbohydrates and other organic substances.
In the future this might become a good source of hydrogen for stationary applications, but hydrogen is way too bulky to make a good auto fuel.
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Bill Dale 4:23PM (12/04/2006)
I notice that Phoenix Motorcars does not appear in your list of car manufacturers-- it really deserves to be added. It is the only pure electric car available (unless you have $100,000. for a two-seat Tesla).
The Phoenix is using the breakthrough Altair nano-titanate battery that, if it delivers on its promise (the first Phoenix was assembled with the new battery on Friday) it will handle all of the probs associated with electrics.
It will have a range of 130 or 250 miles depending on choice of battery pack, can be fully recharged in 7-15 minutes (!!!), does not heat up when charging and discharging, will not explode even when deliberately abused or baked in an oven (Li ion batteries are dangerously volatile, judging from the half-billion dollars in Sony laptop recalls).
The nano-titanate battery is expected to last through tens of thousands of charge-discharge cycles (as opposed to Li ions, which will fail in as little as 750 charge cycles).
Phoenix is ramping up production on their electric cars as fast as possible, but even then only expects to have a few hundred built within the next year. I can't wait till I have my own.
I yearn for a day when even the heaviest highway traffic is unpolluted and nearly silent, when sitting in stalled traffic does not mean a long line of vehicles with their engines still idling, wasting fuel-- no smog stations, calalytic converters, no engines with thousands of temperamental parts (electrics have ONE moving part-- the motor, which just spins on its own center of gravity). Imagine the day when a car repair shop is just a place that does body work, and we can have a solar panel at home to recharge, so there are no gas stations, either. Utter simplicity.
Imagine a day soon when the biggest expense of driving is car insurance, and where none of your money goes to OPEC countries that hate us and use our money to destroy us and finance terrorism.
If you sit, as I did, and imagine how different our world would be if all cars were electric... how different our cars would be, no orange haze to spoil our cityscape... no sound pollution... being able to disconnect from the oil company's umbilical cord... that's a world worth wanting.
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