Scientists Have Discovered an Enzyme That Converts Air Into Electricity

Abstract Electric Power Energy Concept Illustration

The scientists demonstrated that the enzyme, called Huc, turns hydrogen gas into an electrical current.

Australian researchers have discovered an enzyme that can convert air into energy.

Australian researchers have uncovered an enzyme capable of transforming air into energy. The study, which was recently published in the prestigious journal Nature, shows that the enzyme utilizes small amounts of hydrogen in the air to generate an electrical current. This breakthrough paves the way for the development of devices that can literally generate energy from thin air.

The discovery was made by a team of scientists led by Dr. Rhys Grinter, Ashleigh Kropp, a Ph.D. student, and Professor Chris Greening from the Monash University Biomedicine Discovery Institute in Melbourne, Australia. The team produced and studied a hydrogen-consuming enzyme sourced from a bacterium commonly found in soil.

Recent work by the team has shown that many bacteria use hydrogen from the atmosphere as an energy source in nutrient-poor environments. “We’ve known for some time that bacteria can use the trace hydrogen in the air as a source of energy to help them grow and survive, including in Antarctic soils, volcanic craters, and the deep ocean,” Professor Greening said. “But we didn’t know how they did this, until now.”

In this Nature paper, the researchers extracted the enzyme responsible for using atmospheric hydrogen from a bacterium called Mycobacterium smegmatis. They showed that this enzyme, called Huc, turns hydrogen gas into an electrical current.

Dr. Grinter notes, “Huc is extraordinarily efficient. Unlike all other known enzymes and chemical catalysts, it even consumes hydrogen below atmospheric levels – as little as 0.00005% of the air we breathe.”

The researchers used several cutting-edge methods to reveal the molecular blueprint of atmospheric hydrogen oxidation. They used advanced microscopy (cryo-EM) to determine its atomic structure and electrical pathways, pushing boundaries to produce the most resolved enzyme structure reported by this method to date. They also used a technique called electrochemistry to demonstrate the purified enzyme creates electricity at minute hydrogen concentrations.

Laboratory work performed by Ms. Kropp shows that it is possible to store purified Huc for long periods.

“It is astonishingly stable. It is possible to freeze the enzyme or heat it to 80 degrees Celsius, and it retains its power to generate energy,” Ms. Kropp said. “This reflects that this enzyme helps bacteria to survive in the most extreme environments.”

Huc is a “natural battery” that produces a sustained electrical current from air or added hydrogen. While this research is at an early stage, the discovery of Huc has considerable potential to develop small air-powered devices, for example as an alternative to solar-powered devices.

The bacteria that produce enzymes like Huc are common and can be grown in large quantities, meaning we have access to a sustainable source of the enzyme. Dr. Grinter says that a key objective for future work is to scale up Huc production. “Once we produce Huc in sufficient quantities, the sky is quite literally the limit for using it to produce clean energy.”

Reference: “Structural basis for bacterial energy extraction from atmospheric hydrogen” by Rhys Grinter, Ashleigh Kropp, Hari Venugopal, Moritz Senger, Jack Badley, Princess R. Cabotaje, Ruyu Jia, Zehui Duan, Ping Huang, Sven T. Stripp, Christopher K. Barlow, Matthew Belousoff, Hannah S. Shafaat, Gregory M. Cook, Ralf B. Schittenhelm, Kylie A. Vincent, Syma Khalid, Gustav Berggren and Chris Greening, 8 March 2023, Nature.
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-023-05781-7 

21 Comments on "Scientists Have Discovered an Enzyme That Converts Air Into Electricity"

  1. You can generate electricity out of the thin air, but what was consumed in this case?

  2. @James

    Trace amounts of hydrogen in the air

  3. Radical ronald | March 10, 2023 at 6:54 pm | Reply

    So they found what Tesla knew a century ago..

  4. If scientifically viable, this breakthrough promises to open vast new technological possibilities and scientific fields and specialties

    • Earlier the Better | March 14, 2023 at 10:54 am | Reply

      Yes, we need abundant Energy. But, we also need Genetically Engineered Mycobacterium smegmatis Bacteria to kill Cancerous tumors as provided in Latest news. With regard to Cholesterol, We can maintain it by avoiding Carbohydrates/Sugars. 1 More thing. They are working on Alzheimer’s. Hopefully, there will be a breakthrough in it also!

    • Earlier the Better | March 14, 2023 at 11:07 am | Reply

      Sorry, Escherichia coli Bacteria; NOT Mycobacterium smegmatis Bacteria that were genetically engineered.

  5. remember this ten years from now. This discovery will not go anywhere, there are too many powerful people who dont want energy breakthroughs to change the socioeconomic structure of our world. this team will be payed off to keep their mouths shut or they will die in mysterious accidents. our world is corrupt and we are all slaves.

  6. I totally agree with mr smith’s comment “we are all slaves”

  7. Power companies large and small…even solar companies can’t afford to let this discovery get past the “wish” stage…

  8. Yes watch this carefully because yes they will be paid very well or die in some stupid way and we will still be SLAVES! The question is what can we do about it?

  9. Ghislain J Soucy | March 14, 2023 at 9:25 am | Reply

    Need it more now than ever befor fuel dino dope.

  10. Earlier the Better | March 14, 2023 at 10:32 am | Reply

    This is good news. Electricity from various ways. I just read now that Bacteria are genetically engineered to kill cancerous tumors. It is worthy of Immediate Nobel Prize.

  11. Earlier the Better | March 14, 2023 at 12:47 pm | Reply

    When I checked on videos for ‘Huc enzyme’, it seemeed this is partly 3-year old news. Now, they have identified, extracted this enzyme and proved it. Well, Scitech is like climbing the Stairs, anyway. This is NOT a Magic to Hell as almost all Stupidly believe.

  12. This is why we use wind power over the hills and mountains on the way to Los angles. Instead of Solar panels

  13. Paul Hercules Smith | March 16, 2023 at 3:44 am | Reply

    Just the beginning of more newly discovered methods of sustainable energy production.Most consider wind generation to be caused by sunlight heating surface areas on earth therefore wind is just another manifestation of solar energy.

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