For more than thirty years, scientists have been trying to figure out how to efficiently replicate one of nature’s most fundamental processes: photosynthesis, the source of energy for nearly all life on earth. Finally, after much head-scratching, a breakthrough by scientists in Sweden could soon prove itself the key to unlocking the sun’s vast potential as a renewable energy source.
Until recently, the two main problems holding back the development of artificial photosynthesis have been cost and speed (how quickly the process can produce useable energy.) However, the research undertaken by a team of scientists from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm, published last month in the journal Nature, means that one of these obstacles has now been overcome.