(MIT: Cambridge, MA) -- Carbon dioxide (CO₂) is a major contributor to climate change and a significant product of many human activities, notably industrial manufacturing. A major goal in the energy field has been to chemically convert emitted CO₂ into valuable chemicals or fuels. But while CO₂ is available in abundance, it hasn’t yet been widely used to generate value-added products. Why not?

The reason is that CO₂ molecules are highly stable and therefore not prone to being chemically converted to a different form. Researchers have sought materials and device designs that could help spur that conversion, but nothing has worked well enough to yield an efficient, cost-effective system.

Two years ago, Ariel Furst, the Raymond and Helen St. Laurent Career Development Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT, decided to try using something different: a material that gets more attention in discussions of biology than of chemical engineering. Already, results from work in her lab suggest that her unusual approach is paying off.

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