Merino-Jimenez I, Obata O, Pasternak G, Gajda I, Greenman J, Ieropoulos I
Laboratory of Microbial Electrochemical Systems, Faculty of Chemistry, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, 50-370, Wroclaw, Poland.
Instituto de Microelectrónica de Barcelona, IMB-CNM (CSIC), Spanish National Research Council, C/ del Til·lers, Campus Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain.
Process Biochem. 2021 Feb;101:294-303. doi: 10.1016/j.procbio.2020.10.014.
Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) offer an excellent solution to tackle some of the major challenges currently faced by humankind: sustainable energy sources, waste management and water stress. Besides treating wastewater and producing useful electricity from urine, ceramic MFCs can also generate biocidal catholyte . It has been proved that the electricity generation from the MFCs has a high impact in the catholyte composition. Therefore, the catholyte composition constantly changes while electricity is generated. However, these changes in catholyte composition with time has not yet been studied and that could highly contribute to the disinfection efficacy. In this work, the evolution of the catholyte generation and composition with the MFC operation time has been chemically and microbiologically evaluated, during 42 days. The results show an increase in pH and conductivity with the operation time, reaching pH 11.5. Flow cytometry and luminometer analyses of bioluminescent pathogenic exposed to the synthesised catholyte revealed killing properties against bacterial cells. A bio-electrochemical system, capable of electricity generation and simultaneous production of bactericidal catholyte from human urine is presented. The possibility to electrochemically generate a bacterial killing agent from urine, offers a great opportunity for water reuse and resource recovery for practical implementations.
微生物燃料电池（MFCs）为应对人类目前面临的一些重大挑战提供了绝佳解决方案：可持续能源、废物管理和水资源压力。除了处理废水和从尿液中产生有用的电能外，陶瓷MFCs还能产生具有杀菌作用的阴极电解液。事实证明，MFCs发电对阴极电解液的成分有很大影响。因此，在发电过程中，阴极电解液的成分不断变化。然而，阴极电解液成分随时间的这些变化尚未得到研究，而这可能对消毒效果有很大贡献。在这项工作中，在42天的时间里，对阴极电解液的产生及其成分随MFC运行时间的演变进行了化学和微生物学评估。结果表明，随着运行时间的增加，pH值和电导率升高，达到了pH 11.5。对暴露于合成阴极电解液的发光致病体进行的流式细胞仪和发光计分析显示，其对细菌细胞具有杀伤特性。本文介绍了一种能够发电并同时从人尿中产生杀菌阴极电解液的生物电化学系统。从尿液中电化学产生细菌杀伤剂的可能性为实际应用中的水再利用和资源回收提供了巨大机会。
