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Phoenix666 [soylentnews.org] writes:

Using ultrafast imaging of moving energy in photosynthesis [phys.org], scientists have determined the speed of crucial processes for the first time.

This should help scientists understand how nature has perfected the process of photosynthesis, and how this might be copied to produce fuels by artificial photosynthesis.

During photosynthesis, plants harvest light and, though a chemical process involving water and carbon dioxide, convert this into fuel for life.

A vital part of this process is using the light energy to split water into oxygen and hydrogen. This is done by an enzyme called Photosystem II. Light energy is harvested by 'antennae', and transferred to the reaction centre of Photosystem II, which strips electrons from water. This conversion of excitation energy into chemical energy, known as 'charge separation', is the first step in splitting water.

It was previously thought that the process of charge separation in the reaction centre was a 'bottleneck' in photosynthesis - the slowest step in the process - rather than the transfer of energy along the antennae.

Original Submission