Scientists have developed a reactor that mimics plants by turning sunlight into fuel. This is another discovery that could be implemented on a mass scale simply by using the sun. Researchers at the California Institute of Technology have built a reactor with a quartz window that absorbs sunlight and acts as a concentration device to direct sunlight to a desired location. In the center of the reactor is something called oxide, which allows oxygen to exhale from its crystalline structure at high temperatures, and inhale oxygen back at lower temperatures

Specifically, the inhaled oxygen is stripped off of carbon dioxide (CO2) and/or waterRe (H2O) gas molecules that are pumped into the reactor, producing carbon monoxide (CO) and/or hydrogen gas (H2). H2 can be used to fuel hydrogen fuel cells; CO, combined with H2, can be used to create synthetic gas, or “syngas,” which is the precursor to liquid hydrocarbon fuels. Adding other catalysts to the gas mixture, meanwhile, produces methane. And once the ceria is oxygenated to full capacity, it can be heated back up again, and the cycle can begin anew.