Jan. 30, 2013 ? Hydro?gen has tremen?dous poten?tial as an eco-friendly fuel, but it is expen?sive to pro?duce. Now researchers at Prince?ton Uni?ver?sity and Rut?gers Uni?ver?sity have moved a step closer to har?ness?ing nature to pro?duce hydro?gen for us.
The team, led by Prince?ton chem?istry pro?fes?sor Annabella Sel?l?oni, takes inspi?ra?tion from bac?te?ria that make hydro?gen from water using enzymes called di-iron hydro?ge?nases. Selloni's team uses com?puter mod?els to fig?ure out how to incor?po?rate the magic of these enzymes into the design of prac?ti?cal syn?thetic cat?a?lysts that humans can use to pro?duce hydro?gen from water.
In this lat?est paper, Sel?l?oni and co-authors present a solu?tion to an issue that has dogged the field: the cat?a?lysts designed so far are sus?cep?ti?ble to poi?son?ing by the oxy?gen present dur?ing the reac?tion. By mak?ing changes to the cat?a?lyst to improve the sta?bil?ity of the struc?ture in water, the researchers found that they had also cre?ated a cat?a?lyst that is tol?er?ant to oxy?gen with?out sac?ri?fic?ing effi?ciency. What is more, their arti?fi?cial cat?a?lyst could be made from abun?dant and cheap com?po?nents, such as iron, indi?cat?ing that the cat?a?lyst could be a cost-effective way of pro?duc?ing hydrogen.
Sel?l?oni and her team con?ducted their research in sil?ico -- that is, using com?puter mod?el?ing. The goal is to learn enough about how these cat?a?lysts work to some?day cre?ate work?ing cat?a?lysts that can make vast quan?ti?ties of inex?pen?sive hydro?gen for use in vehi?cles and elec?tric?ity production.
The team included Patrick Hoi-Land Sit, an asso?ciate research scholar in chem?istry at Prince?ton; Roberto Car, Princeton's Ralph W. *31 Dornte Pro?fes?sor in Chem?istry, and Mor?rel H. Cohen, a Senior Chemist at Prince?ton and Mem?ber of the Grad?u?ate Fac?ulty of Rut?gers Uni?ver?sity. Sel?l?oni is Princeton's David B. Jones Pro?fes?sor of Chemistry.
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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Princeton University. The original article was written by Cather?ine Zan?donella.
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Journal Reference:
- P. H.- L. Sit, R. Car, M. H. Cohen, A. Selloni. Oxygen tolerance of an in silico-designed bioinspired hydrogen-evolving catalyst in water. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2013; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1215149110
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