Converting a Sand Dollar into a Semiconductor

In nature, many organisms (e.g. the sand dollar) create amazing structures from calcium carbonate, commonly known as chalk. Researchers at AMOLF have developed a method to convert such carbonate structures into light emitting semiconductors that can be used for solar cells. They can even synthesize complex artificial 3D microstructures of similar materials and convert them into different semiconductors. This publication will appear in Nature Chemistry. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41557-018-0064-1 Reference: Tim Holtus, Lukas Helmbrecht, Hans C. Hendrikse, Iaroslav Baglai, Sophie Meuret, Gede W. P. Adhyaksa, Erik C. Garnett, Wim L. Noorduin, Shape-preserving transformation of carbonate minerals into lead-halide perovskite semiconductors based on ion exchange/insertion reactions, Nature Chemistry 2018.