Liu Z D, Du Z W, Lian J, Zhu X Y, Li S H, Li H R
National Key Laboratory of Biochemical Engineering, Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
Lett Appl Microbiol. 2007 Apr;44(4):393-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1472-765X.2006.02088.x.
To study the physiology and metabolism of microbial cells in the performance of microbial fuel cells (MFCs).
A dual-chamber MFCs was constructed, and Rhodoferax ferrireducens was used as biocatalyst. To examine the physiology of microbial cells in the performance of MFCs, the anode media containing planktonic cells was replaced with fresh media in which KH(2)PO(4) and/or NH(4)Cl were excluded. The replacing of anode media containing planktonic cells with fresh media excluded of KH(2)PO(4) and NH(4)Cl made the coulombic yield remarkably increased by a factor of 68% (from 29.1 to 46.8C). The results showed that the electricity could be generated with cells in biofilms as biocatalyst, and coulombic yield was improved by limiting cell growth via removal of ingredients in anode media. By supplementation of glucose to the anode media when current declined to baseline, MFCs achieved about same platform current values immediately. MFCs could continue to produce electricity for about 30 h even after glucose was below detection.
Biofilms and metabolism of glucose play important roles in the performance of MFCs. Coulombic yield of MFCs could be improved by regulating the media ingredients using the stable biofilms-electrode system.
This is the first attempt to study the effect of ingredient compositions of anode media on the performance of MFCs. The observed results that MFCs continued to produce electricity after glucose was below detection was helpful to better understand the mechanism of microbial electricity production.
研究微生物燃料电池（MFC）运行过程中微生物细胞的生理和代谢情况。
构建了双室MFC，并使用嗜铁还原红杆菌作为生物催化剂。为了研究MFC运行过程中微生物细胞的生理情况，将含有浮游细胞的阳极培养基替换为不含KH₂PO₄和/或NH₄Cl的新鲜培养基。用不含KH₂PO₄和NH₄Cl的新鲜培养基替换含有浮游细胞的阳极培养基后，库仑效率显著提高了68%（从29.1提高到46.8库仑）。结果表明，以生物膜中的细胞作为生物催化剂可以产生电流，并且通过去除阳极培养基中的成分来限制细胞生长可提高库仑效率。当电流降至基线时，通过向阳极培养基中补充葡萄糖，MFC立即达到了大致相同的平台电流值。即使葡萄糖含量低于检测限，MFC仍可继续发电约30小时。
生物膜和葡萄糖代谢在MFC的性能中起着重要作用。利用稳定的生物膜 - 电极系统调节培养基成分可提高MFC的库仑效率。
这是首次尝试研究阳极培养基成分对MFC性能的影响。观察到的葡萄糖含量低于检测限后MFC仍继续发电的结果有助于更好地理解微生物发电的机制。
