  The light-driven reactions of photosynthesis, as well as the mitochondrial
power supply, are hosted within specialized membranes containing a high
fraction of redoxactive lipids. Protein mobility and diffusion of redox lipids
is believed to be the in plane charge transfer mechanism along such cell
membranes. Using a membrane-on-a-chip setup, we show that redox-active model
membranes can conduct and sustain surprisingly high (mA) currents with a
specific resistivity typical for semiconductors. Our data suggest that charge
transfer within cell walls hosting electron-transferchains is driven by
self-assembling molecular redox-wires that effectively couple redox-proteins by
a simultaneous electron and proton in plane hopping within a membrane. This
completely alters our understanding of the role of lipid membranes with
wide-range implications suggesting e.g. that conducting membranes may be the
precursor for evolving complex redox-machineries of life, and electrochemical
membrane deterioration may play an important role in mitochondrial aging.
Further, these self-assembling organic 2D-conductors offer technologically
exploitable features allowing for designing self-assembling and adaptive
bio-electronics.
