Humans have for ages taken cues from nature to build their
own devices, but duplicating the steps in the complicated electronic dance of
photosynthesis remains one of the biggest challenges and opportunities for
chemists.
Currently, the most efficient methods we have for making
fuel – principally, hydrogen – from sunlight and water involve rare and
expensive metal catalysts, such as platinum. In a new study, researchers at the
U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory have found a new, more
efficient way to link a less expensive synthetic cobalt-containing catalyst to
an organic light-sensitive molecule, called a chromophore.