Lutetium single atoms can be used to build microscopic vertical highways that turn carbon dioxide into fuel using sunlight.
April 26, 2026
Original Paper
Single Atoms Create Long-Lived Interlayer Charge Highways for Efficient Visible-Light CO2 Photoconversion
SSRN · 6641587
The Takeaway
Converting greenhouse gases into usable energy usually fails because the electrical charges get stuck in a microscopic traffic jam. Anchoring individual atoms of lutetium between layers of carbon nitride creates a bridge for these charges to move freely. This setup allows the system to capture visible light and transform CO2 into carbon monoxide with incredible efficiency. Most catalysts struggle to move electrons between different layers of a material. This bridge-building technique makes it possible to harvest solar energy for industrial-scale chemical recycling.
From the abstract
Photocatalytic CO₂ reduction on graphitic carbon nitride (CN) is hindered by slow interlayer charge transfer. While single-atom catalysts (SACs) are often confined to in-plane sites, we propose a distinct interlayer-SAC strategy by anchoring lutetium (Lu) single atoms within CN interlayers (LuCNv0.20). Advanced characterizations and density functional theory (DFT) confirm the formation of unique interlayer Lu-N electronic bridges, which serve as dedicated vertical charge channels. Femtosecond tr