Energy harvesting

Modify the spreadsheet to calculate the energy flux from each star and hence identify the wavelength most suited for energy harvesting in each case. 

In the artificial system Figure 4b, a polymerized surfactant vesicle is substituted for the thylakoid membrane. Energy is harvested by semiconductors, rather than by PSI and PSII. Electron transfer is rather simple. Water (rather than C02) is reduced in the reduction half cycle to hydrogen, at the expense of benzyl alcohol. In spite of these differences, the basic principles in plant and mimetic photosyntheses are similar. Components of both are compartmentalized. The sequence of events is identical in both systems energy harvesting, vectorial charge separation, and reduction. 

The importance of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotides in biochemical pathways is attested by the fact that about 250 enzymes that utilize them as coenzymes are known (B-75MI11001). Nicotinamides play essential roles in the two major types of process that characterize life energy harvestation and biosynthesis. 

Related dendrons and their energy-harvesting and energy-transfer properties ... 

Finally, the concept of depletion times, as it is used in the construction of the sustainability parameter, is also suitable to include the sustainability of production of facilities needed to harvest resources. For instance, solar energy may in principle have a depletion time of billions of years, but the production of photovoltaic cells usually requires some very scarce elements for which the depletion times are much smaller. The sustainability of using solar energy harvested with photovoltaic cells should then be based on these latter depletion times and not on the depletion time of solar energy itself. 

When successful, however, the full advantage of microsystem design can be utilized, i.e., low power consumption, small volume and weight, low cost, cheap, and reproducible mass production, as well as low vacuum requirements, portability, and even long-term application on battery or even energy harvesting power supply can be envisioned. 

Vlachopoulos, N., Liska, P., Augustynski, J. and Gratzel M. 1987. Very efficient visible light energy harvesting and conversion by spectral sensitization of high surface area polycrystalline titanium dioxide films. Submitted for publication. 

Photophysical processes are commonly encountered and can participate in such important phenomena as energy harvesting (antenna effect), which is the basis for natural photosynthesis and artificial systems mimicking it [4-21] (see below). 

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