Stealing Electricity from Algae
“We have shown that we can steal an electrical current from algae,” said Fritz Prinz, a scientist from Stanford University and co-author of the ACS Nano Letters article.
In the scientists’ case, they stole electrons from a widespread and well studied algae called Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. To be able to extract energy from the algae, the scientists must first essentially jump-start the cells by applying what’s called an over voltage, a tiny current of electricity that zaps the cell into action.
The over voltage only works when the algae are exposed to sunlight. If the algae cells are zapped in the dark, they will not produce any current. When zapped and exposed to light, however, the electricity flows.
The amount of current harvested from the algae is tiny — far too little to power any consumer electrical device. To get even one amp, the scientists would have to hook up trillions of cells, said Prinz.
That would take far too long, since the process reduces the algae’s lifespan down to tens of minutes. Furthermore, the amount of current harvested does not exceed the amount of current necessary to jump start the algae into producing energy; there was no net gain in energy from the experiment.
