Why not recruit complex living microorganisms for in vivo fuel and chemical production powered by sunlight?

Semi-biological photosynthesis combines synthetic light absorbers with live cells to allow for the stable production of complex chemicals. Microbes have metabolic pathways, either natural or engineered, that can be exploited for the synthesis of fuels, platform and fine chemicals or pharmaceuticals. We are interested in interfacing such microbes with custom-made high surface area photoelectrodes or semiconductor particles to study their fundamental biology and drive interesting endergonic reactions. We thereby examine and optimise the material-microbe interface using a range of techniques to ultimately use and manipulate the metabolic pathways of microbes for the solar-driven production of chemicals.