In one embodiment, the present invention includes logic to receive a permute instruction, first and second source operands, and control values, and to perform a permute operation based on an operation between at least two of the control values. The process is particularly useful to accomplish a sustained photobiological hydrogen gas production in cultures of microorganisms, such as Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. The two-dimensional scanning unit is configured for controlling the light from the point light source to project onto an object to obtain image points, which are reflected and arrayed in a matrix on the object and scanning the image points.