World's 1st Artificial Solar Powered Nano-Plants Created
Good news for those who think that machines are getting entirely too good at replacing humans - they've set their sights on the plants as well. Of course, this assumes your definition of "good" includes "misery loves company". A recent nanotechnological breakthrough means that machines could access the most awesome power source available - the sun.
Machines harnessing solar power is nothing new, but the macroscale solar panel approach remains woefully inefficient. You might notice that the average plant doesn't need a hundred square meters of Saharan desert to be economically viable. Huge advances in cellular biology and molecular machinery make the Gulliverian dream of extracting sunlight from cucumbers look shortsighted - why should we squeeze it out of them when we can work out how they do it?
Quantum mechanics specifies that every light photon only has a fixed amount of energy, which it can transfer to an electron when absorbed. The key to photosynthesis is combining several of these excited electrons into a single higher energy step. Scientists at the Hebei Normal University of Science and Technology in Qinhuangdao, China, have constructed just such a nano-manifold - a carbon nanotube which can accept multiple electrons as the core of a photosynthetic engine.
The full multiple-charge system, with the truly awesome name of "Dn-A supermolecule", consists of a large number of visible light absorbing phthalocyanine molecules covalently bonded to the single walled nanotube. So whatever else you do, don't play these guys at Scrabble.
Further elements of a full faux-photosynthetic system still have to be found, but this kind of progress demonstrates the truly incredible science we're now capable. There was a time when "Poems [were] made by fools like me, but only God can make a tree." Nowadays you want a tree? Okay, some scientists will work on this bit, some on that bit....
Posted by Luke McKinney.
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Posted by: surf | July 17, 2008 at 01:43 AM
lol !
Posted by: Yordan Yanakiev | July 17, 2008 at 11:25 PM
Gee this reads like "Previews of Coming Attractions."
Like something new is about to happen soon.
What if it takes another 1000 years for science to develop further technique so it can find all the other missing bits?
Posted by: Timbucktoo | July 22, 2008 at 04:14 AM
wont more information about
NANA tehc, and gns structure i our mind adn how can change dns or gns or dnk molekuls
Posted by: vitalik | July 24, 2008 at 02:05 PM