Shown here is an artifical leaf that has been engineered to execute photosynthesis 10 times more efficiently than a real leaf.  It’s a stable and inexpensive advanced solar cell, no bigger than a playing card, that uses sunlight to split water into oxygen and hydrogen.  Oxygen and hydrogen are then stored in a fuel cell to produce electricity.  This artifical leaf can operate continuously for 45 hours with no loss of activity, and when floating in a single gallon of water it produces enough electricity to power a small house for an entire day.

Thanks to Kedmobee for bringing this to the attention of the It’s Interesting community.

Read about it at the links below:

http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/issues/2009/may/theartificialleaf.asp

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/03/artificial-leaf/