Natural photosynthesis stores sunlight in chemical energy carriers, but it has not evolved for the efficient synthesis of fuels, such as H₂. Semi-artificial photosynthesis combines the strengths of natural photosynthesis with synthetic chemistry and materials science to develop model systems that overcome nature’s limitations, such as low-yielding metabolic pathways and non-complementary light absorption by photosystems I and II. Here, we report a bias-free semi-artificial tandem platform that wires photosystem II to hydrogenase for overall water splitting. This photoelectrochemical cell integrated the red and blue light-absorber photosystem II with a green light-absorbing diketopyrrolopyrrole dye-sensitized TiO₂ photoanode, and so enabled complementary panchromatic solar light absorption. Effective electronic communication at the enzyme–material interface was engineered using an osmium-complex-modified redox polymer on a hierarchically structured TiO₂. This system provides a design protocol for bias-free semi-artificial Z schemes in vitro and provides an extended toolbox of biotic and abiotic components to re-engineer photosynthetic pathways.

天然光合作用将阳光存储在化学能载体中，但尚未发展为可高效合成燃料（例如H _2）。半人工光合作用将自然光合作用的优势与合成化学和材料科学相结合，以开发出克服自然界限制的模型系统，例如低产量的代谢途径以及光系统I和II的非互补性光吸收。在这里，我们报告了一个无偏差的半人工串联平台，该平台将光系统II连接到氢化酶进行整体水分解。该光电化学电池将吸收红光和蓝光的光敏系统II与吸收绿光的二酮吡咯并吡咯染料敏化的TiO ₂集成在一起光电阳极，从而使互补的全色太阳能吸收成为可能。酶-材料界面的有效电子通讯是通过在复合结构的TiO ₂上使用–络合物改性的氧化还原聚合物进行的。该系统提供了体外无偏半人工Z方案的设计方案，并提供了生物和非生物成分的扩展工具箱，以重新设计光合途径。