Artificial 'leaf' could make electricity
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (UPI) -- U.S. researchers say an artificial "leaf" of silicon can use sunlight to split water into hydrogen and oxygen thatcan be fed into fuel cells to make power.
"You drop it in a glass of water and you walk outside and hold it inthe sun, and you'll start to see bubbles of hydrogen and oxygen,"Daniel Nocera, an MIT professor who led the team that invented thedevice, told The Boston Globe.
The leaf could solve a challenge facing solar power of how to storeenergy produced by the sun so it can be used on cloudy days, thenewspaper said Thursday.
Instead of charging a battery, the energy could be stored as oxygenand hydrogen gases to be later combined in fuel cells to generateelectricity, the researchers said.
The next step, Nocera said, is to scale up the technology to produceenough hydrogen and oxygen for a fuel cell to power a car or home.
He likes the invention for its simplicity, he said.
"I don't have to have anything wired up, I don't have to plug it intoanything," he said. "That's what leaves do: They take sunlight andthey make a wireless current -- like what is happening here."
Copyright 2011 by United Press International
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