Symbiotic animals containing green photobionts challenge the common perception that only plants are capable of capturing the sun's rays and converting them into biological energy through photoautotrophic CO(2) fixation (photosynthesis). 'Solar-powered' sacoglossan molluscs, or sea slugs, have taken this type of symbiotic association one step further by solely harboring the photosynthetic organe...

Using controlled environmental growth chambers, whole plants of soybean, cv. ‘Clark’, were examined during early development (7–20 days after sowing) at both ambient (μ 350 μL L–1) and elevated (μ 700 μL L–1) carbon dioxide and a range of air temperatures (20, 25, 30, and 35 °C) to determine if future climatic change (temperature or CO2 concentration) could alter the ratio of carbon lost by dar...

In this paper, a new principle biosensor for non-invasive monitoring of the regulation of photosynthetic metabolism based on quantitative measurement of delayed fluorescence (DF) is developed. The biosensor, which uses light-emitting diode lattice as excitation light source and a compact Single Photon Counting Module to collect DF signal, is portable and can evaluate plant photosynthesis capaci...

Chlorophyll a fluorescence (ChlF) has been used for decades to study the organization, functioning, and physiology of photosynthesis at the leaf and subcellular levels. ChlF is now measurable from remote sensing platforms. This provides a new optical means to track photosynthesis and gross primary productivity of terrestrial ecosystems. Importantly, the spatiotemporal and methodological context...

C4 photosynthesis represents a most remarkable case of convergent evolution of a complex trait, which includes the reprogramming of the expression patterns of thousands of genes. Anatomical, physiological, and phylogenetic and analyses as well as computational modeling indicate that the establishment of a photorespiratory carbon pump (termed C2 photosynthesis) is a prerequisite for the evolutio...

Earth System Models (ESMs) provide the complex simulations of past, current and future climate that are required to inform policy decisions. Because climate change is driven principally by rising atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration ([CO2]), model estimation of future [CO2] will strongly influence climate projections. The inability of ESMs to confidently simulate the enormous CO2 fluxes ass...

Mesophyll conductance, g(m), was estimated from measurements of stomatal conductance to carbon dioxide transfer, g(s), photosynthesis, A, and chlorophyll fluorescence for Year 0 (current-year) and Year 1 (1-year-old) fully sunlit leaves from short (2 m tall, 10-year-old) and tall (15 m tall, 120-year-old) Nothofagus solandrii var. cliffortiodes trees growing in adjacent stands. Rates of photosy...

This contribution discusses why we should consider developing artificial photosynthesis with the tandem approach followed by the Dutch BioSolar Cells consortium, a current operational paradigm for a global artificial photosynthesis project. We weigh the advantages and disadvantages of a tandem converter against other approaches, including biomass. Owing to the low density of solar energy per un...

Abstract As global land surface temperature continues to rise and heatwave events increase in frequency, duration, and/or intensity, our key food fuel cropping systems will likely face increased heat-related stress. A large volume of literature exists on exploring measured modelled impacts rising crop photosynthesis, from enzymatic responses within the leaf up larger ecosystem-scale that reflec...

The growing interest for monitoring the quality of water has triggered the need of fast, portable and cheap detection systems. To answer this problematic, we developed a lab on a chip for herbicide detection based on micro algal photosynthesis. A blue organic light-emitting diode is used as the excitation source while the resulting algae luminescence is monitored using an organic photodiode (OP...