Carbon, of all things, could help us to push forward the decarbonization of our industrial society. Functional carbon particles, known as carbon dots, can transform sunlight into energy and extract hydrogen from water. Prof. Dr. Dirk M. Guldi, a chemist at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), researches the molecular structure of such nanoparticles and uses artificial intelligence in the process.