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"Since the first report on solar fuels production by Fujishima and Honda in 1972, photoelectrochemical/electrochemical production of fuels, such as H2, carbonhydrates, etc., has significantly advanced over the past few decades with the remarkable development in new catalytic materials, fundamental knowledge, and new applications. In particular, the efficiency for solar fuels production steadily increases, for example, solar H2 production efficiency has reached 1.1% in term of the solar-to-hydrogen energy conversion efficiency. These progresses render solar fuels as promising candidates for use in modern technology. In the book Artificial Photosynthesis: From Materials to Devices, experts in the photoelectrochemical/electrochemical field discuss new catalytic materials as well as their photophysical properties and applications for artificial photosynthesis. This book covers the topical research in artificial photosynthesis from conventional particulate catalysts and porous/2D materials to the cutting-edge use of these materials in device fabrication for photoelectrochemistry and electrochemistry, as well as theoretical studies. In terms of applications, this book centers on CO2 photoreduction to valuable carbohydrates and water dissociation into high energy density H2. Throughout the book, examples and illustrations of applications are chosen to help the readers comprehend the achievements and trends in this rapidly evolving field. This book also provides the state-of-the-art research techniques in artificial photosynthesis. This book is informative and helpful for researchers, graduates, and advanced undergraduates interested in the CO2 reduction and water splitting and will assist them to quickly appreciate the research progresses in this field"--

Photosynthesis --- Industrial applications.

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Chloroplasts are plant cell organelles that convert light energy into relatively stable chemical energy via the photosynthetic process. By doing so, they sustain life on Earth. Chloroplasts also provide diverse metabolic activities for plant cells, including the synthesis of fatty acids, membrane lipids, isoprenoids, tetrapyrroles, starch, and hormones. The biogenesis, morphogenesis, protection and senescence of chloroplasts are essential for maintaining a proper structure and function of chloroplasts, which will be the theme of this Research Topic. Chloroplasts are enclosed by an envelope of two membranes which encompass a third complex membrane system, the thylakoids, including grana and lamellae. In addition, starch grains, plastoglobules, stromules, eyespots, pyrenoids, etc. are also important structures of chloroplasts. It is widely accepted that chloroplasts evolved from a free-living photosynthetic cyanobacterium, which was engulfed by a eukaryotic cell. Chloroplasts retain a minimal genome, most of the chloroplast proteins are encoded by nuclear genes and the gene products are transported into the chloroplast through complex import machinery. The coordination of nuclear and plastid genome expressions establishes the framework of both anterograde and retrograde signaling pathways. As the leaf develops from the shoot apical meristem, proplastids and etioplastids differentiate into chloroplasts. Chloroplasts are divided by a huge protein complex, also called the plastid-dividing (PD) machinery, and their division is also regulated by many factors to get an optimized number and size of chloroplasts in the cell. These processes are fundamental for the biogenesis and three-dimensional dynamic structure of chloroplasts. During the photosynthesis, reactive oxygen species (ROS) and other cellular signals can be made. As an important metabolic hub of the plant cell, the chloroplast health has been found critical for a variety of abiotic and biotic stresses, including drought, high light, cold, heat, oxidative stresses, phosphate deprivation, and programmed cell death at sites of infection. Therefore, a better understanding the responses of chloroplasts to these stresses is part of knowing how the plant itself responds. Ultimately, this knowledge will be necessary to engineer crops more resistant to common stresses. With the current global environment changes, world population growth, and the pivotal role of chloroplasts in carbon metabolism, it is of great significance to represent the advancement in this field, for science and society. Tremendous progresses have been made in the field of chloroplast biology in recent years. Through concerted efforts from the community, greater discoveries definitely will emerge in the future.

envelope --- development --- chloroplast --- thylakoid --- Photosynthesis --- Lipid

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Society is currently confronted with the continuing environmental problems of global warming and ocean acidification related to increasing CO2 emission from anthropogenic sources. These environmental issues are also connected to the inevitable energy supply shortage due to the eventual depletion of fossil fuel sources. As a solution, the technology of recycling CO2 into useful organic materials continues to attract attention. This methodology can be categorized into two main parts: CO2 fixation and CO2 reduction. For both reactions, molecular catalysts based on transition metal coordination complexes and organometallic compounds have been developed and examined. Molecular catalysts can be characterized and iteratively improved at the molecular level through spectroscopic experiments and the isolation of intermediate species, which is particularly advantageous in comparison to heterogeneous catalysts. The fixation of CO2 into organic compounds to form a carbon-carbon bond by using organometallic catalysts is a direct methodology for CO2 utilization and represents the potential reversible storage of electrochemical energy in chemical bonds. The resultant carboxylic acid-containing compounds formed as the initial products can be subsequently converted into other organic materials, even products with new chiral centers. The reduction of CO2 by two electrons (often with a proton donor as a co-substrate) yields carbon monoxide (CO) and formic acid (HCOOH), which can be further converted to useful chemicals. Reduction reactions involving more than two electrons and two protons can produce formaldehyde (HCHO), methanol (CH3OH), and methane (CH4), which are also desirable as chemicals and fuels. For molecular electrocatalysts, more negative potentials than the equilibrium ones for CO2 reduction are generally required; the difficulty is that the equilibrium potentials for CO2 reduction are generally negative of the equilibrium potential for proton reduction to produce H2, representing a competing thermodynamically favored process. A complementary approach to an electrochemical one is to mediate CO2 reduction with photo-induced electron transfer reactions. Photo- and electrocatalytic CO2 reduction can be used to achieve artificial photosynthesis, or the production of commodity chemicals and fuels with renewable energy inputs originating from solar sources. This Research Topic covers the molecular catalysts based on coordination and organometallic compounds for CO2 fixation/reduction. It includes chemical, electrochemical, and photochemical reactions. It also covers systematic studies of reaction mechanisms and the spectroscopic characterization of catalytic intermediates. Molecular catalysts for CO2 fixation/reduction used as co-catalysts with heterogeneous catalytic systems are also included. Non-precious and abundant transition metal catalysts for CO2 fixation/reduction are important for future industrial applications as core components of the next generation of energy technologies.

CO2 reduction --- CO2 fixation --- electrocatalysis --- photocatalysis --- artificial photosynthesis

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Photosynthesis. --- Photobiology --- Plants --- Gases from plants --- Effect of light on --- Photorespiration

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Chloroplasts are at the front line of many advancements in molecular biology, ranging from evolutionary biology to the mechanism of energy transduction, also including stress responses and programmed leaf death. In addition to the relevance of basic knowledge, advances are unveiling promising insights to improve plant productivity, disease resistance, and environmental control. The production of secondary metabolites and proteins by transformed chloroplasts adds further excitement to applied investigations on chloroplasts. The comparison of the sequences of the chloroplast DNA of different plants provides valuable information on gene content, reordering in the circular chloroplast DNA, and mutational genetic-derive, relevant to the evolution of the chloroplast. Increasing facilities for intense genome sequencing have prompted many laboratories to focus on the chloroplast DNA. Reflecting these efforts, more than half of the articles in this book deal with functional or evolutionary investigations based on sequence analyses of chloroplast DNA. Additional topics treated in the issue include post-transcriptional control, the processing of nuclear encoded preproteins of chloroplasts, the response of photosynthetic machinery to water deficit, turn-over of chloroplast proteins, mechanism of chloroplast division, and chloroplast movements.

photosynthesis --- endosymbiosis --- plants --- plastid DNA --- electron transport --- thylakoid --- reactive oxygen species (ROS) --- photosystems