Yale University researchers have been studying ways to enhance this natural electrical conductivity within nanowires 1/100,000th width of a human hair by identifying the mechanism of electron flow. In a new study published in Science advances, a team led by graduate student Peter Dahl with Nikhil Malvankar, Assistant Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry in the Microbial Sciences Institute, and Victor Batista, Professor of Chemistry, found that nanowires move 10 billion electrons per second without any energy loss.
These studies explain the remarkable capacity of these bacteria to send electrons over long distances. The team also found that cooling the environment around the nanowires of Geobacter from room temperature to freezing increases conductivity 300-fold.
This is very surprising because cooling typically freezes electrons and slows them down in organic materials. By combining experiments with theory, the researchers found that the colder temperatures restructure hydrogen bonds and flatten heme proteins within nanowires, thus enhancing the flow of electricity. Leveraging this naturally occurring electrical grid might one day lead to the development of living and self-repairing electrical circuits, new sources of electricity and bioremediation strategies.
Other authors include Sophia Yi, Yangqi Gu, Catharine Shipps, Jens Neu, Patrick O'Brien, Dennis Vu and Sibel Ebru Yalcin from the Malvankar Lab, and Atanu Acharya, Uriel Morzan, and Subhajyoti Chaudhuri from the Batista Lab.
Research Report:300-fold conductivity increase in microbial cytochrome nanowires due to temperature-induced restructuring of hydrogen bonding networks
| The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, is Copyright 1995-2026 Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principles for news reporting and research purposes. |
