Fluorographene with Impurities as a Biomimetic Light-Harvesting Medium

TL;DR

This paper explores fluorographene with impurities as a biomimetic light-harvesting medium, demonstrating through quantum calculations that graphene islands can serve as functional building blocks for efficient energy transfer akin to natural photosynthesis.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach to designing light-harvesting systems using fluorographene's quasi-molecular structures, bridging quantum chemistry and biomimetic energy transfer.

Findings

Graphene islands in fluorographene can mimic natural pigments.

Constructed hypothetical energy funnel for excitation transfer.

Predicted near-unity quantum efficiency under certain conditions.

Abstract

We investigate the prospect of using a two-dimensional material, fluorographene, to mimic light-harvesting function of natural photosynthetic antennae. We show by quantum chemical calculations that isles of graphene in a fluorographene sheet can act as quasi-molecules similar to natural pigments from which structures similar in function to photosynthetic antennae can be built. The graphene isles retain enough identity so that they can be used as building blocks to which intuitive design principles of natural photosynthetic antennae can be applied. We examine excited state properties, stability and interactions of these building blocks. Constraints put on the antenna structure by the two-dimensionality of the material as well as the discrete nature of fluorographene sheet are studied. We construct a hypothetical energetic funnel out of two types of quasi-molecules to show how a limited number of building blocks can be arranged to bridge the energy gap and spatial separation in excitation energy transfer. Energy transfer rates for a wide range of the system-environment interaction strengths are predicted. We conclude that conditions for the near unity quantum efficiency of energy transfer are likely to be fulfilled in fluorographene with controlled arrangement of quasi-molecules.