ArticleEnergy & environmental science2017
A Synthetic Biology Approach to Engineering Living Photovoltaics.
Article in Energy & environmental science, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 23 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed, 95 citations in OpenAlex.
- The NAD salvage pathway enzyme NMNAT-C sustains dark-phase NAD+ homeostasis in cyanobacteria.Plant physiology · 2026Article
- Organosulfur compounds as dual-action agents: a critical review of antimicrobial and immunomodulatory potentials, and translational barriers.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2026Review
- Advancements in photosynthetic efficiency: Pathways, regulation, and biotechnological applications for enhancing crop productivity.Plant signaling & behavior · 2025Review
- Wireless in-body sensing through genetically engineered bacteria.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Progress and Prospects of Biomolecular Materials in Solar Photovoltaic Applications.Molecules (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- Understanding the electron pathway fluidity of Synechocystis in biophotovoltaics.The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology · 2025Article
- Bacterial Hybrid Light-Emitting Diodes.Advanced materials (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) · 2024Article
- Materials-driven strategies in bacterial engineering.MRS communications · 2024Review
- Microalgae-material hybrid for enhanced photosynthetic energy conversion: a promising path towards carbon neutrality.National science review · 2023Review
- Living electronics: A catalogue of engineered living electronic components.Microbial biotechnology · 2023Review
- Rational design of artificial redox-mediating systems toward upgrading photobioelectrocatalysis.Photochemical & photobiological sciences : Official journal of the European Photochemistry Association and the European Society for Photobiology · 2021Review
- Proton gradients from light-harvesting E. coli control DNA assemblies for synthetic cells.Nature communications · 2021Article
- The Use of Electroactive Halophilic Bacteria for Improvements and Advancements in Environmental High Saline Biosensing.Biosensors · 2021Article
- Bespoke Biomolecular Wires for Transmembrane Electron Transfer: Spontaneous Assembly of a Functionalized Multiheme Electron Conduit.Frontiers in microbiology · 2021Article
- Unveiling salinity effects on photo-bioelectrocatalysis through combination of bioinformatics and electrochemistry.Electrochimica acta · 2020Article
- Development of a longevous two-species biophotovoltaics with constrained electron flow.Nature communications · 2019Article
- Biogenic Control of Manganese Doping in Zinc Sulfide Nanomaterial UsingFrontiers in microbiology · 2019Article
- Biophotovoltaics: Green Power Generation From Sunlight and Water.Frontiers in microbiology · 2019Review
- Engineering bacteria for biogenic synthesis of chalcogenide nanomaterials.Microbial biotechnology · 2019Article
- Modular engineering to increase intracellular NAD(H/Nature communications · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The ability to electronically interface living cells with electron accepting scaffolds is crucial for the development of next-generation biophotovoltaic technologies. Although recent studies have focused on engineering synthetic interfaces that can maximize electronic communication between the cell and scaffold, the efficiency of such devices is limited by the low conductivity of the cell membrane. This review provides a materials science perspective on applying a complementary, synthetic biology approach to engineering membrane-electrode interfaces. It focuses on the technical challenges behind the introduction of foreign extracellular electron transfer pathways in bacterial host cells and the past and future efforts to engineer photosynthetic organisms with artificial electron-export capabilities for biophotovoltaic applications. The article highlights advances in engineering protein-based, electron-exporting conduits in a model host organism, E. coli, before reviewing state-of-the-art biophotovoltaic technologies that use both unmodified and bioengineered photosynthetic bacteria with improved electron transport capabilities. A thermodynamic analysis is used to propose an energetically feasible pathway for extracellular electron transport in engineered cyanobacteria and identify metabolic bottlenecks amenable to protein engineering techniques. Based on this analysis, an engineered photosynthetic organism expressing a foreign, protein-based electron conduit yields a maximum theoretical solar conversion efficiency of 6-10% without accounting for additional bioengineering optimizations for light-harvesting.
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.