The biofilm characteristics and enhanced performance of a marine microbial-electrolysis-cell-based biosensor under positive anodic potential

Microbial fuel cells have already been used as biosensors to monitor assimilable organic carbon(AOC).However,their signal production from AOC is known to be completely suppressed by dissoved oxygen(DO).In this study,two identical microbial electrolysis cell(MEC)based biosensors were inoculated with marine sediment and operated at two different anodic potentials,namely-300 mV and+250 mV relative to Ag/AgCl.The MEC biosensor operated under positive anodic potential conditions had electrochemically active microbial communities on the anode,including members of the Shewanellaceae,Pseudoalteromonadaceae,and Clostridiaceae families.However,the strictly anaerobic members of the Desulfuromonadaceae,Desulfobulbaceae and Desulfobacteraceae families were found only in the negative anodic potential MEC biosensor.The positive anodic potential MEC biosensor showed several other advantages as well,such as faster start-up,significantly higher maximum current production,fivefold improvement in the AOC detection limit,and tolerance of low dissolved oxygen,compared to those obtained from the negative anodic potential MEC biosensor.The developed positive anodic potential MEC biosensor can thus be used as a real-time and inexpensive detector of AOC concentrations in high saline and low DO seawater.

Electricity generation during wastewater treatment by a microbial fuel cell coupled with constructed wetland

A membrane-less constructed wetland microbial fuel cell （CW-MFC） is constructed and operated under continuous flow with a hydraulic retention time （HRT） of 2 d. Fed with glucose, the CW-MFC generates a stable current density of over 2 A/m3 with a resistor of 1 kΩ and has a chemical oxygen demand （COD） removal efficiency of more than 90% after the startup of 2 to 3 d. A series of systems with the electrode spacings of 10, 20, 30 and 40 cm are compared. It is found that the container with the electrode spacing of 20 cm gains the highest voltage of 560 mV, the highest power density of 0. 149 W/m 3, and the highest Coulombic efficiency of 0.313%. It also has the highest COD removal efficiency of 94. 9%. In addition, the dissolved oxygen （DO） concentrations are observed as the lowest level in the middle of all the CW-MFC reactors. The results show that the more COD is removed, the greater power is generated, and the relatively higher Coulombic efficiency will be achieved. The present study indicates that the CW-MFC process can be used as a cost-effective and environmentally friendly wastewater treatment with simultaneous power generation.

An Air-Breathing Micro Direct Methanol Fuel Cell with 3D KOH-Etched Cathode Structure

A micro direct methanol fuel cell （μDMFC） using MEMS technology is reported. The prototype features a unique 3D air-breathing cathode structure fabricated using KOH etching and double-side lithography. The optimization of the MEMS fabrication process is analyzed. The experimental results show the prototype generates a maximum power density of 2.52mW/cm^2 at room temperature. This performance is better than the published resuits of other silicon-based passive μDMFCs. Moreover,it is comparable with that of our previous active μDMFCs which require an external pump, certificating the feasibility of this new configuration.

Teledyne氧分析仪在连续退火炉中的应用

本文主要介绍美国 Teledyne氧分析仪的特点、使用要点及在攀枝花钢铁公司冷轧厂连续镀锌线 (CGL )

Non-linear performance analysis and voltage control of MFC based on feedforward fuzzy logic PID strategy

Microbial fuel cell(MFC)is a kind of promising clean power supply energy equipment,but serious nonlinearities and disturbances exist when the MFC runs,and it is an important topic to guarantee that the output voltage reaches the setting value quickly and smoothly.Regulating the feeding flow is an effective way to achieve this goal,and especially,the satisfactory results can be achieved by regulating anode feeding flow.In this work,a feedforward fuzzy logic PID algorithm is proposed.The fuzzy logic system is introduced to deal with the non-linear dynamics of MFC,and corresponding PID parameters are calculated according to defuzzification.The magnitude value of the current density is used to simulate the value of the external load.The simulation results indicate that the MFC output voltage can track the setting value quickly and smoothly with the proposed feedforward fuzzy logic PID algorithm.The proposed algorithm is more efficient and robust with respect to anti-disturbance performance and tracking accuracy than other three control methods.

Electricity Generation Using Membrane-less Microbial Fuel Cell during Wastewater Treatment

An upflow mode membrane-less microbial fuel cell （ML-MFC） was designed for wastewater treatment. Granular graphite electrodes, which are flexible in size, were adopted in the ML-MFC. Microbes present in anaerobic activated sludge were used as the biocatalyst and artificial wastewater was tested as substrate. During the electrochemically active microbe enrichment stage, a stable power output of 536 mW.m-3 with reference to the anode volume was generated by the ML-MFC running in batch mode. The voltage output decreased from 203 mV to about 190 mV after the ML-MFC was changed from batch mode to normally continuous mode, indicating that planktonic electrochemically active bacterial strains in the ML-MFC may be carried away along with the effluent. Cyclic voltammograms showed that the attached microbes possessed higher bioelectrochemical activity than the planktonic microbes. Forced aeration to the cathode benefited the electricity generation obviously. Higher feeding rate and longer electrode distance both increased the electricity generation. The coulombic yield was not more than 20% throughout the study, which is lower than that of MFCs with membrane. It is proposed that dissolved oxygen diffused from the cathode to the anode may consume part of the substrate.

A system combining microbial fuel cell with photobioreactor for continuous domestic wastewater treatment and bioelectricity generation

A coupled system consisting of an upflow membrane-less microbial fuel cell (upflow ML-MFC) and a photobioreactor was developed, and its effectiveness for continuous wastewater treatment and electricity production was evaluated. Wastewater was fed to the upflow ML-MFC to remove chemical oxygen demand (COD), phosphorus and nitrogen with simultaneous electricity generation. The effluent from the cathode compartment of the upflow ML-MFC was then continuously fed to an external photobioreactor for removing the remaining phosphorus and nitrogen using microalgae. Alone, the upflow ML-MFC produces a maximum power density of 481 mW/m 3 , and obtains 77.9% COD, 23.5% total phosphorus (TP) and 97.6% NH4+-N removals. When combined with the photobioreactor, the system achieves 99.3% TP and 99.0% NH4+-N total removal. These results show both the effectiveness and the potential application of the coupled system to continuously treat domestic wastewater and simultaneously generate electricity and biomass.

Power production enhancement with polyaniline composite anode in benthic microbial fuel cells

In this study,conductive polymer polyaniline(PANI)is employed to modify the anodes of benthic microbial fuel cells(BMFC).Four electrochemical methods are used to synthesize the polyaniline anodes;the results show that the PANI modification,especially the pulse potential method for PANI synthesis could obviously improve the cell energy output and reduce the anode internal resistance.The anode is modified by PANI doped with Fe or Mn to further improve the BMFC performance.A maximum power density of 17.51 mW/m2 is obtained by PANI-Fe anode BMFC,which is 8.1 times higher than that of control.The PANI-Mn anode BMFC also gives a favorable maximum power density(16.78 mW/m2).Fe or Mn modification has better effect in improving the conductivity of polyaniline,thus improving the energy output of BMFCs.This work applying PANI composite anode into BMFC brings new development prospect and could promote the practical application of BMFC.

Comparative Study of Two Carbon Fiber Cathodes and Theoretical Analysis in Microbial Fuel Cells on Ocean Floor

Cathode activity plays an important role in the improvement of the microbial fuel cells on ocean floor （BMFCs）. A comparison study between Rayon-based （CF-R） and PAN-based carbon fiber （CF-P） cathodes is conducted in the paper. The two carbon fibers were heat treated to improve cell performance （CF-R-H ＆ CF-P-H）, and were used to build a new BMFCs structure with a foamy carbon anode. The maximum power density was 112.4mWm-2 for CF-R-H, followed by 66.6mWm-2 for CF-R, 49.7 mWm-2 for CF-P-H and 21.6mWm-2 for CF-P respectively. The higher specific area and deep groove make CF-R have a better power output than with CF-P. Meanwhile, heat treatment of carbon fiber can improve cell power, nearly two-fold higher than heat treatment of plain fiber. This improvement may be due to the quinones group formation to accelerate the reduction of oxygen and electron transfer on the fiber surface in the three phase boundary after heat treatment. Compared to PAN-based carbon fiber, Rayon-based carbon fiber would be preferentially selected as cathode in novel BMFCs design due to its high surface area, low cost and higher power. The comparison research is significant for cathode material selection and cell design.

Inocula selection in microbial fuel cells based on anodic biofilm abundance of Geobacter sulfurreducens

Microbial fuel cells （MFCs） rely on microbial conversion of organic substrates to electricity. The optimal perfor- mance depends on the establishment of a microbial community rich in electrogenic bacteria. Usually this micro- bial community is established from inoculation of the MFC anode chamber with naturally occurring mixed inocula. In this study, the electrochemical performance of MFCs and microbial community evolution were eval- uated for three inocula including domestic wastewater （DW）, lake sediment （LS） and biogas sludge （BS） with varying substrate loading （Lsub） and external resistance （Rext） on the MFC. The electrogenic bacterium Geobacter sulfurreducens was identified in all inocula and its abundance during MFC operation was positively linked to the MFC performance. The IS inoculated MFCs showed highest abundance （18% ± 1%） of G. sulfurreducens, maximum current density [Imax = （690 ± 30） mA.m 2] and coulombic efficiency （CE = 29% ±1%） with acetate as the substrate./max and CE increased to （1780 ± 30） mA.m-2 and 58%± 1%, respectively, after decreasing the Rext from 1000 Ωto 200 Ω, which also correlated to a higher abundance ofG. sulfurreducens （21% ±0.7%） on the MFC anodic biofilm. The data obtained contribute to understanding the microbial community response to Lsub and Roy, for of timizing electricity eneration in MFCs.

Carbon Foam Anode Modified by Urea and Its Higher Electrochemical Performance in Marine Benthic Microbial Fuel Cell

Electrode materials have an important effect on the property of microbial fuel cell(MFC). Carbon foam is utilized as an anode and further modified by urea to improve its performance in marine benthic microbial fuel cell(BMFC) with higher voltage and output power. The electrochemical properties of plain carbon foam(PC) and urea-modified carbon foam(UC) are measured respectively. Results show that the UC obtains better wettability after its modification and higher anti-polarization ability than the PC. A novel phenomenon has been found that the electrical potential of the modified UC anode is nearly 100 m V lower than that of the PC, reaching-570 ±10 m V(vs. SCE), and that it also has a much higher electron transfer kinetic activity, reaching 9399.4 m W m-2, which is 566.2-fold higher than that from plain graphite anode(PG). The fuel cell containing the UC anode has the maximum power density(256.0 m W m-2) among the three different BMFCs. Urea would enhance the bacteria biofilm formation with a more diverse microbial community and maintain more electrons, leading to a lower anodic redox potential and higher power output. The paper primarily analyzes why the electrical potential of the modified anode becomes much lower than that of others after urea modification. These results can be utilized to construct a novel BMFC with higher output power and to design the conditioner of voltage booster with a higher conversion ratio. Finally, the carbon foam with a bigger pore size would be a potential anodic material in conventional MFC.

Electrochemical Properties of Electrodes with Different Shapes and Diffusion Kinetic Analysis of Microbial Fuel Cells on Ocean Floor

Microbial fuel cell(MFC) on the ocean floor is a kind of novel energy-harvesting device that can be developed to drive small instruments to work continuously.The shape of electrode has a great effect on the performance of the MFC.In this paper,several shapes of electrode and cell structure were designed,and their performance in MFC were compared in pairs:Mesh(cell-1) vs.flat plate(cell-2),branch(cell-3) vs.cylinder(cell-4),and forest(cell-5) vs.disk(cell-6) FC.Our results showed that the maximum power densities were 16.50,14.20,19.30,15.00,14.64,and 9.95 mWm-2 for cell-1,2,3,4,5 and 6 respectively.And the corre-sponding diffusion-limited currents were 7.16,2.80,18.86,10.50,18.00,and 6.900 mA.The mesh and branch anodes showed higher power densities and much higher diffusion-limited currents than the flat plate and the cylinder anodes respectively due to the low diffusion hindrance with the former anodes.The forest cathode improved by 47% of the power density and by 161% of diffusion-limited current than the disk cathode due to the former's extended solid/liquid/gas three-phase boundary.These results indicated that the shape of electrode is a major parameter that determining the diffusion-limited current of an MFC,and the differences in the elec-trode shape lead to the differences in cell performance.These results would be useful for MFC structure design in practical applica-tions.

Impact of Korean Ginseng （Panax Ginseng） on Power Generation of Microbial Fuel Cells

This study reports an increase in power generation of a MFC （microbial fuel cell） by the addition of Korean ginseng （Panax ginseng）. It was noted that the use of ginseng enhances the microbial anaerobic degradation of cellobiose, a disaccharide that was used as a substrate in the anode chamber of the MFC. The power output of the MFC where ginseng was added showed noticeable enhancement compared to the control MFC. The increase slowly ramped at the initial days and became appreciably higher after the 11th day of incubation in an experiment set up for 16 days duration. It is attributed that the ginseng increases the CO2 production by accelerating the fermentation process. Decrease in CH4/CO2 ratio was observed also due to decrease in methane production per digested cellobiose, the proton donor in the current study. Four ring steroid-like structural moiety Ginsenoside of Panax ginseng seemed to play a beneficial role in the electron transfer from ceilobiose to the anode, perhaps by rendering easier electron transfer due to favorable energy level alignments.

Fabrication of micro-flow channels on graphite composite bipolar plates using microplaning

A new method of manufacturing micro-flow channels on graphite composite bipolar plate(GCBPP) microplaning using specially designed multi-tooth tool is proposed. In this method, several or even dozens of parallel micro-flow channels ranging from 100 μm to 500 μm in width can be produced simultaneously. But, edge chippings easily occur on the rib surface of GCBPP during microplaning due to brittleness of graphite composites. Experimental results show that edge chippings result in the increase of contact resistance between bipolar plate and carbon paper at low compaction force. While the edge chippings scarcely exert influence on the contact resistance at high compaction force. Contrary to conventional view, the edge chippings can significantly improve performance of microfuel cell and big edge chippings outperform small edge chippings. In addition, the influence of technical parameters on edge chippings was investigated in order to obtain big, but not oversized edge chippings.

Lowest Temperature Miniature Fuel Cell with Modified PS PEM Membrane and Fueled with Nitrogen, Sulfur and Oxygen Containing Fuels

Polymer exchange membrane fuel cells （PEMFC） are objects of the current engineering technology and these are versatile generators for electrical energy. There are various kinds from them, but all of them are going on work at highest temperature. There isn＇t a PEMFC which can run at room temperature, like 20 ℃. In this study there is a aim for constructing such one for alternative fuels utilisation. PS and many electroconducting polymer formulations were proved by different researchers for PEM benefications, but here PS was synthesized without containing metalic contaminants and after converted to the PEM membrane.

Multi-objective steady-state optimization of two-chamber microbial fuel cells

A microbial fuel cell(MFC)is a novel promising technology for simultaneous renewable electricity generation and wastewater treatment.Three non-comparable objectives,i.e.power density,attainable current density and waste removal ratio,are often conflicting.A thorough understanding of the relationship among these three conflicting objectives can be greatly helpful to assist in optimal operation of MFC system.In this study,a multiobjective genetic algorithm is used to simultaneously maximizing power density,attainable current density and waste removal ratio based on a mathematical model for an acetate two-chamber MFC.Moreover,the level diagrams method is utilized to aid in graphical visualization of Pareto front and decision making.Three biobjective optimization problems and one three-objective optimization problem are thoroughly investigated.The obtained Pareto fronts illustrate the complex relationships among these three objectives,which is helpful for final decision support.Therefore,the integrated methodology of a multi-objective genetic algorithm and a graphical visualization technique provides a promising tool for the optimal operation of MFCs by simultaneously considering multiple conflicting objectives.

Design and Performance Analysis of Micro Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells

This study describes a novel micro proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC)(active area,2.5 cm2).The flow field plate is manufactured by applying micro-electromechanical systems(MEMS) technology to silicon substrates to etch flow channels without a gold-coating.Therefore,this investigation used MEMS technology for fabrication of a flow field plate and presents a novel fabrication procedure.Various operating parameters,such as fuel temperature and fuel stoichiometric flow rate,are tested to optimize micro PEMFC performance.A single micro PEMFC using MEMS technology reveals the ideal performance of the proposed fuel cell.The optimal power density approaches 232.75 mW·cm-1 when the fuel cell is operated at ambient condition with humidified,heated fuel.

Electron transfer from sulfate-reducing bacteria biofilm promoted by reduced graphene sheets

Reduced graphene sheets (RGSs) mediate electron transfer between sulfate-reducing bacteria (SRB) and solid electrodes, and promote the development of microbial fuel cells (MFC). We have investigated RSG-promoted electron transfer between SRB and a glassy carbon (GC) electrode. The RGSs were produced at high yield by a chemical sequence involving graphite oxidation, ultrasonic exfoliation of nanosheets, and N2H4 reduction. Cyclic voltammetric testing showed that the characteristic anodic peaks (around 0.3 V) might arise from the combination of bacterial membrane surface cytochrome c3 and the metabolic products of SRB. After 6 d, another anodic wave gradually increased to a maximum current peak and a third anodic signal became visible at around 0 V. The enhancements of two characteristic anodic peaks suggest that RSGs mediate electron-transfer kinetics between bacteria and the solid electrode. Manipulation of these recently-discovered electron-transport mechanisms will lead to significant advances in MFC engineering.

Submicron γ-LiAlO_2 Powder Synthesized from Boehmite

The present study reports a simple,effective and energy-efficient method to prepare γ-LiAlO2 powder as a matrix in a molten carbonate fuel cell(MCFC).In our experiments,aqueous solution based sol-gel technique was used to synthesize γ-LiAlO2.Highly dispersed AlOOH·nH2O and LiOH·H2O aqueous solutions were mixed to form a colloid mixture,which was calcined to synthesize γ-LiAlO2.Thermogravimetric analysis(TGA),X-ray dif-fraction(XRD),and scanning electron microscopy(SEM) were used to study the composition and morphology of the intermediate and final products.The analysis results showed that an intermediate product Li2Al4CO3(OH)12 was produced after the colloid mixture was dried at 80 ℃,and highly purified γ-LiAlO2 powder with fine particle size was resulted from the subsequent calcinations.A single MCFC was assembled with a matrix of the γ-LiAlO2 pow-der.The testing results showed that the matrix performed well in preventing gas leakage.

Identification of the Electricity-Producing Bacteria in Wastewater for Microbial Fuel Cells （MFCs）

A microbial fuel cell （MFC） is a device that converts chemical energy to electrical energy during substrate oxidation by microorganisms. The characterization and identification of these microbial communities will allow better control of this electricity generation with simultaneous removal of carbon and nitrogen. This study aims to investigate the role of natural bacteria in electricity generation by studying three different sources of wastewater： the raw wastewater （RW）, wastewater from an aeration tank （AEW） and returned activated sludge （RAS） from an activated sludge treatment plant. The result showed that after the MFC treatment, the number of bacterial strains was reduced from twenty strains to eight strains. Microscopic observation further showed that fifteen isolate before the treatment were gram-positive, and five were gram-negative whereas all isolates after the treatment were gram-positive rods or cocci The four strains isolated from the RAS inoculums, β-Comamonas sp., γ-Enterobacter sp., Bacillus cereus sp. and Clostridium sp. produced the highest power density of 67.57 mW/m^2 which made them potential candidates for electrochemically active bacteria in MFCs. However, the level of chemical oxygen demand （COD） removal was 20% and the total kjeldahl nitrogen （TKN） removal was 66.7%. Key words：