New materials for bio-based hydrogen synthesis: Synthetic biology enables spontaneous protein activation

New materials for bio-based hydrogen synthesis: Synthetic biology enables spontaneous protein activation

Activating hydrogen-generating enzymes: Once an inactive hydrogenase precursor (detail of the active centre: top left in the picture) is added to the inactive chemically synthesised cofactor (top right), the hydrogenase spontaneously integrates the synthetic component. Hydrogenases (bottom) are thus created that are indistinguishable from natural enzymes. The complex active centre of the enzymes (bottom middle) into which the cofactor is integrated catalyses the generation of hydrogen highly efficiently. (Credit: Copyright Julian Esselborn, RUB)