̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Paolo Bombelli

Algae-powered computing: scientists create reliable and renewable biological photovoltaic cell

jg533 — Thu, 12 May 2022 08:43:43 +0000

̽��ֱ��system, comparable in size to an AA battery, contains a type of non-toxic algae called Synechocystis that naturally harvests energy from the sun through photosynthesis. ̽��ֱ��tiny electrical current this generates then interacts with an aluminium electrode and is used to power a microprocessor.

̽��ֱ��system is made of common, inexpensive and largely recyclable materials. This means it could easily be replicated hundreds of thousands of times to power large numbers of small devices as part of the Internet of Things. ̽��ֱ��researchers say it is likely to be most useful in off-grid situations or remote locations, where small amounts of power can be very beneficial.

“ ̽��ֱ��growing Internet of Things needs an increasing amount of power, and we think this will have to come from systems that can generate energy, rather than simply store it like batteries,” said Professor Christopher Howe in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry, joint senior author of the paper.

He added: “Our photosynthetic device doesn’t run down the way a battery does because it’s continually using light as the energy source.”

In the experiment, the device was used to power an Arm Cortex M0+, which is a microprocessor used widely in Internet of Things devices. It operated in a domestic environment and semi-outdoor conditions under natural light and associated temperature fluctuations, and after six months of continuous power production the results were submitted for publication.

̽��ֱ��study is published today in the journal Energy & Environmental Science.

“We were impressed by how consistently the system worked over a long period of time – we thought it might stop after a few weeks but it just kept going,” said Dr Paolo Bombelli in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry, first author of the paper.

̽��ֱ��algae does not need feeding, because it creates its own food as it photosynthesises. And despite the fact that photosynthesis requires light, the device can even continue producing power during periods of darkness. ̽��ֱ��researchers think this is because the algae processes some of its food when there’s no light, and this continues to generate an electrical current.

̽��ֱ��Internet of Things is a vast and growing network of electronic devices - each using only a small amount of power - that collect and share real-time data via the internet. Using low-cost computer chips and wireless networks, many billions of devices are part of this network - from smartwatches to temperature sensors in power stations. This figure is expected to grow to one trillion devices by 2035, requiring a vast number of portable energy sources.

̽��ֱ��researchers say that powering trillions of Internet of Things devices using lithium-ion batteries would be impractical: it would need three times more lithium than is produced across the world annually. And traditional photovoltaic devices are made using hazardous materials that have adverse environmental effects.

̽��ֱ��work was a collaboration between the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and Arm, a company leading the design of microprocessors. Arm Research developed the ultra-efficient Arm Cortex M0+ testchip, built the board, and set up the data-collection cloud interface presented in the experiments.

̽��ֱ��research was funded by the National Biofilms Innovation Centre.

Reference

Bombelli, P et al: ‘Powering a Microprocessor by Photosynthesis.’ Energy & Environmental Science, May 2022. DOI: 10.1039/D2EE00233G

Researchers have used a widespread species of blue-green algae to power a microprocessor continuously for a year – and counting – using nothing but ambient light and water. Their system has potential as a reliable and renewable way to power small devices.

Our photosynthetic device doesn’t run down the way a battery does because it’s continually using light as the energy source.

Chris Howe

Paolo Bombelli

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Images, including our videos, are Copyright © ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and licensors/contributors as identified. All rights reserved. We make our image and video content available in a number of ways – as here, on our main website under its Terms and conditions, and on a range of channels including social media that permit your use and sharing of our content under their respective Terms.

Yes

Licence type:

Attribution

Green energy and better crops: tinted solar panels could boost farm incomes

jg533 — Tue, 04 Aug 2020 08:37:54 +0000

By allowing farmers to diversify their portfolio, this novel system could offer financial protection from fluctuations in market prices or changes in demand, and mitigate risks associated with an unreliable climate. On a larger scale it could vastly increase capacity for solar-powered electricity generation without compromising agricultural production.

This is not the first time that crops and electricity have been produced simultaneously using semi-transparent solar panels – a technique called ‘agrivoltaics’. But in a novel adaptation, the researchers used orange-tinted panels to make best use of the wavelengths - or colours - of light that could pass through them.

̽��ֱ��tinted solar panels absorb blue and green wavelengths to generate electricity. Orange and red wavelengths pass through, allowing plants underneath to grow. While the crop receives less than half the total amount of light it would get if grown in a standard agricultural system, the colours passing through the panels are the ones most suitable for its growth.

“For high value crops like basil, the value of the electricity generated just compensates for the loss in biomass production caused by the tinted solar panels. But when the value of the crop was lower, like spinach, there was a significant financial advantage to this novel agrivoltaic technique,” said Dr Paolo Bombelli, a researcher in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry, who led the study.

̽��ֱ��combined value of the spinach and electricity produced using the tinted agrivoltaic system was 35% higher than growing spinach alone under normal growing conditions. By contrast, the gross financial gain for basil grown in this way was only 2.5%. ̽��ֱ��calculations used current market prices: basil sells for around five times more than spinach. ̽��ֱ��value of the electricity produced was calculated by assuming it would be sold to the Italian national grid, where the study was conducted.

“Our calculations are a fairly conservative estimate of the overall financial value of this system. In reality if a farmer were buying electricity from the national grid to run their premises then the benefit would be much greater,” said Professor Christopher Howe in the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry, who was also involved in the research.

̽��ֱ��study found the saleable yield of basil grown under the tinted solar panels reduced by 15%, and spinach reduced by around 26%, compared to under normal growing conditions. However, the spinach roots grew far less than their stems and leaves: with less light available, the plants were putting their energy into growing their ‘biological solar panels’ to capture the light.

Laboratory analysis of the spinach and basil leaves grown under the panels revealed both had a higher concentration of protein. ̽��ֱ��researchers think the plants could be producing extra protein to boost their ability to photosynthesise under reduced light conditions. In an additional adaptation to the reduced light, longer stems produced by spinach could make harvesting easier by lifting the leaves further from the soil.

“From a farmer’s perspective, it’s beneficial if your leafy greens grow larger leaves - this is the edible part of the plant that can be sold. And as global demand for protein continues to grow, techniques that can increase the amount of protein from plant crops will also be very beneficial,” said Bombelli.

“With so many crops currently grown under transparent covers of some sort, there is no loss of land to the extra energy production using tinted solar panels,” said Dr Elinor Thompson at the ̽��ֱ�� of Greenwich, and lead author of the study.

All green plants use the process of photosynthesis to convert light from the sun into chemical energy that fuels their growth. ̽��ֱ��experiments were carried out in Italy using two trial crops. Spinach (Spinacia oleracea) represented a winter season crop: it can grow with fewer daylight hours and can tolerate colder weather. Basil (Ocimum basilicum) represented a summer season crop, requiring lots of light and higher temperatures.

̽��ֱ��researchers are currently discussing further trials of the system to understand how well it would work for other crops, and how growth under predominantly red and orange light affects the crops at the molecular level.

This research was conducted in partnership with Polysolar Ltd. It was funded by the Leverhulme Trust and the Italian Ministry of ̽��ֱ�� and Research.

Reference
Thompson, E. et al: Tinted Semi-Transparent Solar Panels allow Concurrent Production of Crops and Electricity on the Same Cropland. Advanced Energy Materials, 2 Aug 2020. DOI: 10.1002/aenm.202001189

Researchers have demonstrated the use of tinted, semi-transparent solar panels to generate electricity and produce nutritionally-superior crops simultaneously, bringing the prospect of higher incomes for farmers and maximising use of agricultural land.

Our calculations are a fairly conservative estimate of the overall financial value of this system. In reality if a farmer were buying electricity from the national grid to run their premises then the benefit would be much greater

Christopher Howe

Paolo Bombelli ( ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge)

Greenhouse with tinted solar panels

Yes

Harnessing the power of algae: new, greener fuel cells move step closer to reality

cjb250 — Wed, 10 Jan 2018 11:18:27 +0000

As the global population increases, so too does energy demand. ̽��ֱ��threat of climate change means that there is an urgent need to find cleaner, renewable alternatives to fossil fuels that do not contribute extensive amounts of greenhouse gases with potentially devastating consequences on our ecosystem. Solar power is considered to be a particularly attractive source as on average the Earth receives around 10,000 times more energy from the sun in a given time than is required by human consumption.

In recent years, in addition to synthetic photovoltaic devices, biophotovoltaics (BPVs, also known as biological solar-cells) have emerged as an environmentally-friendly and low-cost approach to harvesting solar energy and converting it into electrical current. These solar cells utilise the photosynthetic properties of microorganisms such as algae to convert light into electric current that can be used to provide electricity.

During photosynthesis, algae produce electrons, some of which are exported outside the cell where they can provide electric current to power devices. To date, all the BPVs demonstrated have located charging (light harvesting and electron generation) and power delivery (transfer to the electrical circuit) in a single compartment; the electrons generate current as soon as they have been secreted.

In a new technique described in the journal Nature Energy, researchers from the departments of Biochemistry, Chemistry and Physics have collaborated to develop a two-chamber BPV system where the two core processes involved in the operation of a solar cell – generation of electrons and their conversion to power – are separated.

“Charging and power delivery often have conflicting requirements,” explains Kadi Liis Saar, of the Department of Chemistry. “For example, the charging unit needs to be exposed to sunlight to allow efficient charging, whereas the power delivery part does not require exposure to light but should be effective at converting the electrons to current with minimal losses.”

Building a two-chamber system allowed the researchers to design the two units independently and through this optimise the performance of the processes simultaneously.

“Separating out charging and power delivery meant we were able to enhance the performance of the power delivery unit through miniaturisation,” explains Professor Tuomas Knowles from the Department of Chemistry and the Cavendish Laboratory. “At miniature scales, fluids behave very differently, enabling us to design cells that are more efficient, with lower internal resistance and decreased electrical losses.”

̽��ֱ��team used algae that had been genetically modified to carry mutations that enable the cells to minimise the amount of electric charge dissipated non-productively during photosynthesis. Together with the new design, this enabled the researchers to build a biophotovoltaic cell with a power density of 0.5 W/m2, five times that of their previous design. While this is still only around a tenth of the power density provided by conventional solar fuel cells, these new BPVs have several attractive features, they say.

"While conventional silicon-based solar cells are more efficient than algae-powered cells in the fraction of the sun’s energy they turn to electrical energy, there are attractive possibilities with other types of materials," says Professor Christopher Howe from the Department of Biochemistry. “In particular, because algae grow and divide naturally, systems based on them may require less energy investment and can be produced in a decentralised fashion."

Separating the energy generation and storage components has other advantages, too, say the researchers. ̽��ֱ��charge can be stored, rather than having to be used immediately – meaning that the charge could be generated during daylight and then used at night-time.

While algae-powered fuel cells are unlikely to generate enough electricity to power a grid system, they may be particularly useful in areas such as rural Africa, where sunlight is in abundance but there is no existing electric grid system. In addition, whereas semiconductor-based synthetic photovoltaics are usually produced in dedicated facilities away from where they are used, the production of BPVs could be carried out directly by the local community, say the researchers.

“This a big step forward in the search for alternative, greener fuels,” says Dr Paolo Bombelli, from the Department of Biochemistry. “We believe these developments will bring algal-based systems closer to practical implementation.”

̽��ֱ��research was supported by the Leverhulme Trust, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the European Research Council.

Reference
Saar, KL et al. Enhancing power density of biophotovoltaics by decoupling storage and power delivery. Nature Energy; 9 Jan 2018; DOI: 10.1038/s41560-017-0073-0

A new design of algae-powered fuel cells that is five times more efficient than existing plant and algal models, as well as being potentially more cost-effective to produce and practical to use, has been developed by researchers at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge.

This a big step forward in the search for alternative, greener fuels

Paolo Bombelli

Kadi Liis Saar

Artist' impression

Researcher Profile: Dr Paolo Bombelli

Dr Paolo Bombelli is a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Biochemistry, where his research looks to utilise the photosynthetic and metabolic activity of plants, algae and bacteria to create biophotovoltaic devices, a sustainable source of renewable current. He describes himself as “a plants, algae and bacteria electrician”.

“Photosynthesis generates a flow of electrons that keeps plants, algae and other photosynthetic organisms alive,” he explains. “These electrons flow though biological wires and, like the electrical current obtained from a battery and used to power a radio, they are the driving force for any cellular activity.”

Dr Bombelli’s fascination with this area of research began during his undergraduate studies at the ̽��ֱ�� of Milan.

“Plants, algae and photosynthetic bacteria are the oldest, most common and effective solar panels on our planet,” he says. “For billions of years they have been harnessing the energy of the sun and using it to provide oxygen, food and materials to support life. With my work I aim to provide new ways to embrace the potential of these fantastic photosynthetic organisms.”

His work is highly cross-disciplinary, with input from the Departments of Biochemistry, Plant Sciences, Chemistry and Physics, and the Institute for Manufacturing, as well as from researchers at Imperial College London, UCL, the ̽��ֱ�� of Brighton, the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia in Spain and the ̽��ֱ�� of Cape Town, South Africa.

“Universities are great places to work and so they attract many people,” he says. “People choose to come to Cambridge because they know the ideas they generate here will go on to change the world.”

In 2016, Dr Bombelli won a Public Engagement with Research Award by the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge for his work engaging audiences at more than 40 public events, including science festivals and design fairs, reaching thousands of people in seven countries. His outreach work included working with Professor Chris Howe to develop a prototype ‘green bus shelter’ where plants, classical solar panels and bio-electrochemical systems operate in synergy in a single structure.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Caterpillar found to eat shopping bags, suggesting biodegradable solution to plastic pollution

fpjl2 — Mon, 24 Apr 2017 15:52:27 +0000

Scientists have found that a caterpillar commercially bred for fishing bait has the ability to biodegrade polyethylene: one of the toughest and most used plastics, frequently found clogging up landfill sites in the form of plastic shopping bags.

̽��ֱ��wax worm, the larvae of the common insect Galleria mellonella, or greater wax moth, is a scourge of beehives across Europe. In the wild, the worms live as parasites in bee colonies. Wax moths lay their eggs inside hives where the worms hatch and grow on beeswax – hence the name.

A chance discovery occurred when one of the scientific team, Federica Bertocchini, an amateur beekeeper, was removing the parasitic pests from the honeycombs in her hives. ̽��ֱ��worms were temporarily kept in a typical plastic shopping bag that became riddled with holes.

Bertocchini, from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), collaborated with colleagues Paolo Bombelli and Christopher Howe at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge’s Department of Biochemistry to conduct a timed experiment.

Around a hundred wax worms were exposed to a plastic bag from a UK supermarket. Holes started to appear after just 40 minutes, and after 12 hours there was a reduction in plastic mass of 92mg from the bag.

Scientists say that the degradation rate is extremely fast compared to other recent discoveries, such as bacteria reported last year to biodegrade some plastics at a rate of just 0.13mg a day. Polyethylene takes between 100 and 400 years to degrade in landfill sites.

"If a single enzyme is responsible for this chemical process, its reproduction on a large scale using biotechnological methods should be achievable," said Cambridge's Paolo Bombelli, first author of the study published today in the journal Current Biology.

"This discovery could be an important tool for helping to get rid of the polyethylene plastic waste accumulated in landfill sites and oceans."

Polyethylene is largely used in packaging, and accounts for 40% of total demand for plastic products across Europe – where up to 38% of plastic is discarded in landfills. People around the world use around a trillion plastic bags every single year.

Generally speaking, plastic is highly resistant to breaking down, and even when it does the smaller pieces choke up ecosystems without degrading. ̽��ֱ��environmental toll is a heavy one.

Yet nature may provide an answer. ̽��ֱ��beeswax on which wax worms grow is composed of a highly diverse mixture of lipid compounds: building block molecules of living cells, including fats, oils and some hormones.

̽��ֱ��researchers say it is likely that digesting beeswax and polyethylene involves breaking similar types of chemical bonds, although they add that the molecular detail of wax biodegradation requires further investigation.

“Wax is a polymer, a sort of ‘natural plastic,’ and has a chemical structure not dissimilar to polyethylene,” said CSIC’s Bertocchini, the study’s lead author.

̽��ֱ��researchers conducted spectroscopic analysis to show the chemical bonds in the plastic were breaking. ̽��ֱ��analysis showed the worms transformed the polyethylene into ethylene glycol, representing un-bonded ‘monomer’ molecules.

To confirm it wasn’t just the chewing mechanism of the caterpillars degrading the plastic, the team mashed up some of the worms and smeared them on polyethylene bags, with similar results.

“ ̽��ֱ��caterpillars are not just eating the plastic without modifying its chemical make-up. We showed that the polymer chains in polyethylene plastic are actually broken by the wax worms,” said Bombelli.

“ ̽��ֱ��caterpillar produces something that breaks the chemical bond, perhaps in its salivary glands or a symbiotic bacteria in its gut. ̽��ֱ��next steps for us will be to try and identify the molecular processes in this reaction and see if we can isolate the enzyme responsible.”

As the molecular details of the process become known, the researchers say it could be used to devise a biotechnological solution on an industrial scale for managing polyethylene waste.

Added Bertocchini: “We are planning to implement this finding into a viable way to get rid of plastic waste, working towards a solution to save our oceans, rivers, and all the environment from the unavoidable consequences of plastic accumulation.”

A common insect larva that eats beeswax has been found to break down chemical bonds in the plastic used for packaging and shopping bags at uniquely high speeds. Scientists say the discovery could lead to a biotechnological approach to the polyethylene waste that chokes ocean ecosystems and landfill sites.

̽��ֱ��caterpillar produces something that breaks the chemical bond, perhaps in its salivary glands or a symbiotic bacteria in its gut

Paolo Bombelli

̽��ֱ��research team.

Close-up of wax worm next to biodegraded holes in a polyethylene plastic shopping bag from a UK supermarket as used in the experiment.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Winners announced in the inaugural Vice-Chancellor’s Impact Awards and Public Engagement with Research Awards

jeh98 — Tue, 21 Jun 2016 09:58:54 +0000

On Monday 20 June, the Vice-Chancellor and Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research presented two sets of inaugural awards; the Impact Awards run by the Research Strategy Office, and the Public Engagement with Research Awards run by the Public Engagement team in the Office of External Affairs and Communications.

Research at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge has had profound effects on society – it is a formal part of the ̽��ֱ��’s mission.

̽��ֱ��Vice-Chancellor’s Impact Awards have been established to recognise and reward those whose research has led to excellent impact beyond academia, whether on the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life.

In this, its inaugural year, there were 71 nominations across all Schools. Nominations were initially judged by School, with one overall best entry selected by external advisor Schlumberger. A prize of £1,000 was awarded to the best impact in each School, with the prize for the overall winner increased to £2,000.

̽��ֱ��winners were announced at an award ceremony on 20 June 2016, hosted by Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz. These winners, although very diverse, illustrate only a small part of the wide range of impact that Cambridge's research has had.

This year’s winners were:

Dr Mari Jones (Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages)

Norman French has been spoken in Jersey for over 1,000 years. Today, however, this language (Jèrriais to its speakers) is obsolescent: spoken by some 1% of the population. ̽��ֱ��research of Mari Jones has sought to preserve Jèrriais and has helped raise the profile of the language within Jersey and beyond, with impacts on local and national media, language policy and education, and cultural identity and development.

Dr Gilly Carr (Department of Archaeology and Anthropology)

̽��ֱ��Channel Islands have long had great difficulty in coming to terms with the darker side of the German occupation. ̽��ֱ��aim of Gilly Carr’s research is to increase awareness of Channel Islander victims of Nazi persecution through creation of a plural ‘heritage landscape’ and via education. ̽��ֱ��creation of this heritage is a major achievement and will be of significant impact for the Channel Islands.

Professor Steve Jackson (Wellcome Trust/CRUK Gurdon Institute)

Olaparib is an innovative targeted therapy for cancer developed by Steve Jackson. In 2014 Olaparib was licensed for the treatment of advanced ovarian cancer by the US Food and Drug Administration and the European Medicines Agency. ̽��ֱ��following year, NICE made the drug available on the NHS in England for specific ovarian cancer patients. 2015 saw promising findings from a clinical trial in prostate cancer and Olaparib received Breakthrough Therapy Designation earlier this year. Olaparib is currently in clinical trials for a wide range of other cancer types.

Professor John Clarkson and Dr Nathan Crilly (Department of Engineering)

It is normal to be different. ̽��ֱ��demographics of the world are changing, with longer life expectancies and a reduced birth rate resulting in an increased proportion of older people. Yet with increasing age comes a general decline in capability, challenging the way people are able to interact with the ‘designed’ world around them. ̽��ֱ��Cambridge Engineering Design Centre has worked with the Royal College of Art to address this ‘design challenge’. They developed a design toolkit and realised what was by now obvious, that inclusive design was simply better design.

Dr Nita Forouhi and Dr Fumiaki Imamura (MRC Epidemiology Unit)

Identifying modifiable risk factors is an important step in helping reduce the health burden of poor diet. Forouhi and Imamura have advanced our understanding of the health impacts of sugars, fats and foods, through both scale and depth of investigation of self-reported information and nutritional biomarkers. They have engaged at an international level with policy and guidance bodies, and have used the media to improve public understanding with the potential for a direct impact on people’s health.

In 2015, the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge received a one-year £65k Catalyst Seed Fund grant from Research Councils UK to embed high quality public engagement with research and bring about culture change at an institutional level.

̽��ֱ��Public Engagement with Research Awards were set up to recognise and reward those who undertake quality engagement with research. 69 nominations were received from across all Schools.

This year’s winners were:

Dr Becky Inkster (Department of Psychiatry)

Dr Inkster’s work work explores the intersection of art and science through the prism of mental health research. Dr Inkster has successfully collaborated with ̽��ֱ��Scarabeus Theatre in a performance called Depths of My Mind and founded the website HipHopPsych, showcasing the latest psychiatry research through hip hop lyrics. Her approach has allowed her to engage with hard-to-reach teenage audiences, encouraging them to reflect on their own mental health. Beyond this work she has explored the use of social media to diagnose mental illness, and has gathered patient perspectives on ethics, privacy and data sharing in preparation for research publication.

Dr Paolo Bombelli (Department of Biochemistry)

Dr Bombelli’s research looks to utilise the photosynthetic chemistry of plants to create biophotovoltaic devices, a sustainable source of solar power. For over five years, he has been taking his research out of the lab to science festivals, schools and design fairs; tailoring his approach to a wider variety of audiences. Through his engagement, he has reached thousands of people, in multiple countries, and is currently developing an educational toolkit to further engage school students with advances in biophotovoltaic technology. Dr Bombelli’s public engagement work has also advanced his research, namely through a transition from using algae to moss in live demonstrations.

Dr Ruth Armstrong and Dr Amy Ludlow (Institute of Criminology and Faculty of Law)

Dr Armstrong and Dr Ludlow have collaborated on a research project addressing the delivery of education in the prison sector. Their project, Learning Together, pioneered a new approach to prison education where the end-users, the prisoners, are directly engaged with the design, delivery and evaluation of the research intervention. Adopting this shared dialogue approach has yielded positive results in terms of prisoners’ learning outcomes and has gathered praise from prison staff and government policy makers. Through continued engagement and partnership working, Armstrong and Ludlow have managed to expand their initiative across a broad range of sites and institutional contexts.

Dr Hazel Wilkinson (Department of English)

Dr Wilkinson is investigating the history of reading and writing habits in the eighteenth century. In collaboration with Dr Will Bowers at the ̽��ֱ�� of Oxford, she has developed an online public platform, journallists.org, which allows readers to engage with installments of periodicals, diaries, letters, and novels, on the anniversaries of the day on which they were originally published, written, or set. Her approach has allowed members of the public to actively participate in research. She has also inspired thousands of readers to engage with under-read eighteenth and nineteenth century texts, often for the very first time.

Dr Paul Coxon (Department of Materials Science and Metallurgy)

Over the last ten years Dr Coxon has endeavored to engage with audiences often overlooked by traditional public engagement channels. He has given talks in venues as varied as bingo halls, working men’s social clubs and steam fairs to showcase his passion for solar research, steering clear of the “flashes and bangs” approach often associated with Chemistry. He has also designed a Fruit Solar Cell Starter Kit, used in fifty low-income catchment schools across the UK.

Mr Ian Hosking and Mr Bill Nicholl (Department of Engineering and Faculty of Education)

Ian Hosking and Bill Nicholl are cofounders of Designing Our Tomorrow, a platform for transforming D&T education in schools. Their public engagement initiative began in 2009 and brought together research around inclusive design and creativity in education. Through production of their DOT box, Hosking and Nicholl have taken active research questions into the classroom and given students control of designing technological solutions. Engagement with teachers, students and policymakers is integral to the success of their initiative and has resulted in engineering design being included in the national curriculum and GCSE qualifications.

Researchers from across the ̽��ֱ�� have been recognised for the impact of their work on society, and engagement with research in the inaugural Vice-Chancellor’s Impact Awards and Public Engagement with Research Awards.

̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

Dr Ruth Armstrong and Dr Amy Ludlow receive their award from the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Low-impact hub generates electrical current from pure plant power

lw355 — Fri, 06 Mar 2015 09:00:52 +0000

A prototype “green bus shelter” that could eventually generate enough electricity to light itself, has been built by a collaboration of ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge researchers and eco-companies.

̽��ֱ��ongoing living experiment, hosted by the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden and open to the visiting public, is incorporated in a distinct wooden hub, designed by architects MCMM to resemble a structure like a bus shelter. Eight vertical green wall units – created by green wall specialists, Scotscape – are housed along with four semi-transparent solar panels and two flexible solar panels provided by Polysolar.

̽��ֱ��hub has specially adapted vertical green walls that harvest electrons naturally produced as a by-product of photosynthesis and metabolic activity, and convert them into electrical current. It is the brainchild of Professor Christopher Howe and Dr Paolo Bombelli of the Department of Biochemistry. Their previous experiments resulted in a device able to power a radio using the current generated by moss.

̽��ֱ��thin-film solar panels turn light into electricity by using mainly the blue and green radiation of the solar spectrum. Plants grow behind the solar glass, ‘sharing the light’ by utilising the red spectrum radiation needed for photosynthesis, while avoiding the scorching effect of UV light. ̽��ֱ��plants generate electrical currents as a consequence of photosynthesis and metabolic activity during the day and night.

“Ideally you can have the solar panels generating during the day, and the biological system at night. To address the world’s energy needs, we need a portfolio of many different technologies, and it’s even better if these technologies can operate in synergy,” said Bombelli.

̽��ֱ��structure of the hub allows different combinations of the photovoltaic and biological systems to be tested. On the north east aspect of the hub, plants receive light directly, without being exposed to too much direct sun. On the south west orientation, a green wall panel is housed behind a semi-transparent solar panel so that the effect on the plants and their ability to generate current can be monitored. Next to that, in the same orientation, a single solar panel stands alone, and two further panels are also mounted on the roof.

“ ̽��ֱ��combination of horticulture with renewable energy production constitutes a powerful solution to food and resource shortages on an increasingly populated planet,” explained Joanna Slota-Newson from Polysolar. “We build our semi-transparent solar panels into greenhouses, producing electrical energy from the sun which can in turn be used to power irrigation pumps or artificial lighting, while offering a controlled environment to improve agricultural yields. In this collaboration with Cambridge ̽��ֱ��, the public can experience the plants’ healthy growth behind Polysolar panels.”

̽��ֱ��green wall panels in the hub are made from a synthetic material containing pockets, each holding a litre of soil and several plants. ̽��ֱ��pockets are fitted with a lining of carbon fibre on the back, which acts as an anode to receive electrons from the metabolism of plants and bacteria in the soil, and a carbon/catalyst plate on the front which acts as a cathode.

When a plant photosynthesises, energy from the sun is used to convert carbon dioxide into organic compounds that the plant needs to grow. Some of the compounds – such as carbohydrates, proteins and lipids – are leached into the soil where they are broken down by bacteria, which in turn release by-products, including electrons, as part of the process.

Electrons have a negative charge so, when they are generated, protons (with a positive charge) are also created. When the anode and cathode are connected to each other by a wire acting as an external circuit, the negative charges migrate between those two electrodes. Simultaneously, the positive charges migrate from the anodic region to the cathode through a wet system, in this case the soil. ̽��ֱ��cathode contains a catalyst that enables the electrons, protons and atmospheric oxygen to recombine to form water, thus completing the circuit and permitting an electrical current to be generated in the external circuit.

̽��ֱ��P2P hub therefore generates electrical current from the combination of biological and physical elements. Each element of the hub is monitored separately, and members of the public can track the findings in real time, at a dedicated website and on a computer embedded in the hub itself.

Margherita Cesca, Senior Architect and Director of MCMM Architettura, the hub’s designer, is pleased that it has garnered so much interest. “This prototype is intended to inspire the imagination, and encourage people to consider what could be achieved with these pioneering technologies. ̽��ֱ��challenging design incorporates and showcases green wall and solar panels as well as glass, creating an interesting element which sits beautifully within Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Botanic Garden,” she said.

Bombelli added: “ ̽��ֱ��long-term aim of the P2P solar hub research is to develop a range of self-powered sustainable buildings for multi-purpose use all over the world, from bus stops to refugee shelters.”

̽��ֱ��P2P project was supported by a Partnership Development Award grant from the ̽��ֱ��’s EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account.

P2P is an outreach activity developed under the umbrella of the BPV (BioPhotoVoltaic) project working in collaboration with green technology companies including MCMM, Polysolar and Scotscape. ̽��ֱ��BPV project includes scientists from the Departments of Biochemistry, Plant Sciences, Physics and Chemistry at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, together with the ̽��ֱ�� of Edinburgh, Imperial College London and the ̽��ֱ�� of Cape Town.

Green wall technology and semi-transparent solar panels have been combined to generate electrical current from a renewable source of energy both day and night.

This prototype is intended to inspire the imagination, and encourage people to consider what could be achieved with these pioneering technologies

Margherita Cesca, MCMM Architettura

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̽��ֱ��hidden power of moss

amb206 — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 05:03:47 +0000

Moss is regarded as a menace by gardeners who seek to eradicate it from their lawns. Now researchers all over the world are exploring how moss, algae and plants could be used as a source of renewable energy in the future.

A team of designers and scientists at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� will be exhibiting a novel moss table at the London Design Festival later this week. ̽��ֱ��prototype table will showcase an emerging technology called biophotovoltaics (BPV) which uses the natural process of photosynthesis to generate electrical energy.

Featuring biological fuel cells made from moss, the table has been created as a vision of the future by Alex Driver and Carlos Peralta from Cambridge’s Institute for Manufacturing and Paolo Bombelli from the ̽��ֱ��’s Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology Department.

Still at early stages, BPV has the potential to power small devices such as digital clocks. Low cost BPV devices may become competitive alternatives to conventional renewable technologies such as bio-fuels in the next ten years.

̽��ֱ��appeal of BPV lies in its ability to harness a natural process that takes place all around us. Photosynthesis occurs when plants convert carbon dioxide from the atmosphere into organic compounds using energy from sunlight. Plants use these organic compounds – carbohydrates, proteins and lipids – to grow.

When the moss photosynthesises it releases some of these organic compounds into the soil which contains symbiotic bacteria. ̽��ֱ��bacteria break down the compounds, which they need to survive, liberating by-products that include electrons. ̽��ֱ��table designed by the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� team captures these electrons to produce an electrical current.

̽��ֱ��table is based on research into biophotovoltaics funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). This pioneering work involves collaboration between the Departments of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, Biochemistry and Plant Sciences at Cambridge ̽��ֱ��, and the Chemistry Department at Bath ̽��ֱ��. ̽��ֱ��research is led jointly byDr Adrain Fisher, Professor Christopher Howe and Professor Alison Smith at Cambridge, and Dr Petra Cameron at Bath.

Carlos Peralta said: “ ̽��ֱ��moss table provides us with a vision of the future. It suggests a world in which self-sustaining organic-synthetic hybrid objects surround us, and supply us with our daily needs in a clean and environmentally friendly manner.”

Looking into the future, possible applications for BPV include solar panels, power stations and generators. Currently at concept stage, these are envisaged as sustainable solutions to pressing problems across the world – including the growing need for energy and fresh water from vulnerable communities.

“A modular system of biological solar panels would be mounted on to the roof of a building to supply it with a portion of its energy requirements,” explained Alex Driver “A biophotovoltaic power station would comprise giant algae-coated lily-pads floating on the surface of the ocean near the coastline, generating energy for local communities. A biophotovoltaic generator would feature algae solar collectors mounted on floating buoys and anchored just offshore to generate energy and harvest desalinated water, which is a waste product of one of the chemical reactions occurring in the device.”

̽��ֱ��Cambridge team emphasised that the technology was at very early stages. “It will be a long time before a product powered by this technology will be commercially available,” said Dr James Moutrie, Head of the Design Management Group at the Institute for Manufacturing. “ ̽��ֱ��table we are exhibiting this week demonstrates the ways in which designers can play a valuable role in early stage scientific research by identifying commercial potential and is one of the outcomes from our Design in Science research project.”

Scientists at Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� are exhibiting a prototype table that demonstrates how biological fuel cells can harness energy from plants.

̽��ֱ��moss table provides us with a vision of the future. It suggests a world in which self-sustaining organic-synthetic hybrid objects surround us, and supply us with our daily needs in a clean and environmentally friendly manner.

Carlos Peralta

Institute for Manufacturing, ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge

Close-up of the moss pots incorporated into a novel table developed at Cambridge ̽��ֱ��.

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