Making Hydrogen from Spinach

Another fun teaser article on New Scientist today.  A group of scientists at Oak Ridge National Labs has produced an in vitro system to produce hydrogen gas.  They took the LHC-II (light harvesting complex II) from spinach, and added in some copoloymers and sodium hexachloroplatinate.  The copolymers and LHC-II self-assembled into small sheets.  When light is shined on them, LHC-II absorbs the photons releasing electrons, which are then transfered to the platinum, which can then catalyze the reduction of protons to form hydrogen gas.  They observed the reaction for over 100 hours.  It was unclear to me  whether the platinum was consumed during this process, or if it can be continuously reused.  If it is consumed or must be recharged in some way in order to catalyze further reactions, it seems cost may be an issue.  Nevertheless, hydrogen is an incredibly clean fuel, so it's always exciting to see work done there!  The full scientific article is here.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to read it later in the week.