Dataset Information

Alkaline treatment of used carbon-brush anodes for restoring power generation of microbial fuel cells.

ABSTRACT: Long-term operation of microbial fuel cells (MFCs) results in an electrochemical activity decline by the degradation of the anodic biofilm. In this work, an alkaline soaking treatment is proposed as an efficient and simple method for anode regeneration. The alkaline treatment was employed in a used carbon-brush anode, and its performance was compared with those of two other traditional treatment methods, i.e. air drying and carbonization. Among all the treated MFC anodes, the one treated by alkaline soaking exhibited the highest recovery rate. A series of tests including a start-up process, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), cyclic voltammetry (CV), electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and MFC performance were performed. The results show that alkaline soaking can modify the carbon fiber by introducing carboxyl groups onto the carbon surface and completely remove the aged biofilm, demonstrating that the alkaline treatment of used anodes is a practically effective method for the performance recovery of MFCs.

SUBMITTER: Li L

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9088807 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Alkaline treatment of used carbon-brush anodes for restoring power generation of microbial fuel cells.

Li Lin L Jiang Bo B Tang Dawei D Zhang Xiaoliang X Yuan Kunpeng K Zhang Qian Q

RSC advances 20181031 64

Long-term operation of microbial fuel cells (MFCs) results in an electrochemical activity decline by the degradation of the anodic biofilm. In this work, an alkaline soaking treatment is proposed as an efficient and simple method for anode regeneration. The alkaline treatment was employed in a used carbon-brush anode, and its performance was compared with those of two other traditional treatment methods, <i>i.e.</i> air drying and carbonization. Among all the treated MFC anodes, the one treated ...[more]

PMID: 35558927

Similar Datasets

Project description:BackgroundMicrobial fuel cells (MFCs) rely on electrochemically active bacteria to capture the chemical energy contained in organics and convert it to electrical energy. Bacteria develop biofilms on the MFC electrodes, allowing considerable conversion capacity and opportunities for extracellular electron transfer (EET). The present knowledge on EET is centred around two Gram-negative models, i.e. Shewanella and Geobacter species, as it is believed that Gram-positives cannot perform EET by themselves as the Gram-negatives can. To understand how bacteria form biofilms within MFCs and how their development, structure and viability affects electron transfer, we performed pure and co-culture experiments.ResultsBiofilm viability was maintained highest nearer the anode during closed circuit operation (current flowing), in contrast to when the anode was in open circuit (soluble electron acceptor) where viability was highest on top of the biofilm, furthest from the anode. Closed circuit anode Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilms were considerably thinner compared to the open circuit anode (30 +/- 3 microm and 42 +/- 3 microm respectively), which is likely due to the higher energetic gain of soluble electron acceptors used. The two Gram-positive bacteria used only provided a fraction of current produced by the Gram-negative organisms. Power output of co-cultures Gram-positive Enterococcus faecium and either Gram-negative organisms, increased by 30-70% relative to the single cultures. Over time the co-culture biofilms segregated, in particular, Pseudomonas aeruginosa creating towers piercing through a thin, uniform layer of Enterococcus faecium. P. aeruginosa and E. faecium together generated a current of 1.8 +/- 0.4 mA while alone they produced 0.9 +/- 0.01 and 0.2 +/- 0.05 mA respectively.ConclusionWe postulate that this segregation may be an essential difference in strategy for electron transfer and substrate capture between the Gram-negative and the Gram-positive bacteria used here.

Dataset Information

Alkaline treatment of used carbon-brush anodes for restoring power generation of microbial fuel cells.

Publications

Alkaline treatment of used carbon-brush anodes for restoring power generation of microbial fuel cells.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets