Abstract
Microorganisms (bacteria) naturally form biofilms on solid surfaces. Biofilms can be found in a variety of natural sites, such as sea water sediments, soils, and a range of wastewaters, such as municipal, dye, agricultural, and industrial wastewaters. The biofilms are normally dangerous to human health due to their inherited robustness. Electrochemically active biofilms (EABs) generated by electrochemically active microorganisms (EAMs) have potential applications in bioenergy production, green chemical synthesis, bioremediation, bio-corrosion mitigation, and biosensor development. EABs have attracted considerable attention in bioelectrochemical systems, such as microbial fuel cells (MFCs) and microbial electrolysis cells, where they act as living bio-anode or bio-cathode catalysts. EABs are an anode material in MFCs that generate an excess of electrons and protons by biologically oxidizing substrates, such as sodium acetate or organic waste, and the flow of these electrons produces significant amounts of electricity. Recently, it was found that EABs can be used as a biogenic-reducing tool to synthesize metal nanoparticles and metal–metal oxide nanocomposites. The EAB-mediated synthesis of metal nanoparticles and metal–metal oxide nanocomposites is expected to provide a new avenue for the greener synthesis of nanomaterials with high efficiency than other synthetic procedures. It was also found that EABs could be effectively used as a tool to provide electrons and protons by biologically decomposing acetate which is later used in the presence of a suitable catalyst for the bio-hydrogen production. These nanoparticles as well as nanocomposites syntheses and bio-hydrogen production takes place in water at 30 °C and does not involve any energy input which make these approaches highly efficient. These findings show that EAB is a fascinating biogenic tool for MFCs, nanomaterials synthesis, bioremediation, and bio-hydrogen production.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Ansari SA, Khan MM, Ansari MO, Lee J, Cho MH (2013a) Biogenic synthesis, photocatalytic, and photoelectrochemical performance of Ag-ZnO nanocomposite. J Phys Chem C 117: 27023–27030
Ansari SA, Khan MM, Kalathil S, Nisar A, Lee J, Cho MH (2013b) Oxygen vacancy induced band gap narrowing of ZnO nanostructures by an electrochemically active biofilm. Nanoscale 5:9238–9246
Ansari SA, Khan MM, Ansari MO, Lee J, Cho MH (2014) Highly photoactive SnO2 nanostructures engineered by electrochemically active biofilm. New J Chem 38:2462–2469
Babauta J, Renslow R, Lewandowski Z, Beyenal H (2012) Electrochemically active biofilms: facts and fiction. A review. Biofouling 28:789–812
Bond DR, Holmes DE, Tender LM, Lovely DR (2002) Electrode-reducing microorganisms that harvest energy from marine sediments. Science 295:483–485
Borole AP, Reguera G, Ringeisen B, Wang Z, Feng Y, Kim BH (2011) Electroactive biofilms: current status and future research needs. Energy Environ Sci 4:4813–4834
Brust M, Gordillo GJ (2012) Electrocatalytic hydrogen redox chemistry on gold nanoparticles. J Am Chem Soc 134:3318–3321
Dulon S, Parot S, Delia ML, Bergel A (2007) Electroactive biofilms: new means for electrochemistry. J Appl Electrochem 37:173–179
Erable B, Duteanu NM, Ghangrekar MM, Dumas C, Scott K (2010) Application of electro-active biofilms. Biofouling 26:57–71
Halan B, Buehler K, Schmid A (2012) Biofilms as living catalysts in continuous chemical syntheses. Trends Biotechnol 30:453–465
Han TH, Khan MM, Kalathil S, Lee J, Cho MH (2013) Simultaneous enhancement of methylene blue degradation and power generation in a microbial fuel cell by gold nanoparticles. ACS Ind Eng Chem Res 52:8174–8181
Kalathil S, Lee J, Cho MH (2011) Electrochemically active biofilm-mediated synthesis of silver nanoparticles in water. Green Chem 13:1482–1485
Kalathil S, Khan MM, Banerjee AN, Lee J, Cho MH (2012) A simple biogenic route to rapid synthesis of Au@TiO2 nanocomposites by electrochemically active biofilms. J Nanopart Res 14:1051–1060
Kalathil S, Khan MM, Ansari SA, Lee J, Cho MH (2013a) Band gap narrowing of titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanocrystals by electrochemically active biofilms and their visible light activity. Nanoscale 5:6323–6326
Kalathil S, Khan MM, Lee J, Cho MH (2013b) Production of bioelectricity, bio-hydrogen, high value chemicals and bioinspired nanomaterials by electrochemically active biofilms. Biotech Adv 31:915–924
Kalathil S, Lee J, Cho MH (2013c) Gold nanoparticles produced in situ mediate bioelectricity and hydrogen production in a microbial fuel cell by quantized capacitance charging. ChemSusChem 6:246–250
Kalathil S, Lee J, Cho MH (2013d) Catalytic role of Au@TiO2 nanocomposite on enhanced degradation of an azo-dye by electrochemically active biofilms: a quantized charging effect. J Nanopart Res 15:1392–1398
Khan MM, Kalathil S, Lee J, Cho MH (2012) Synthesis of Cysteine Capped Silver Nanoparticles by Electrochemically Active Biofilm and their Antibacterial Activities. Bull Kor Chem Soc 33:2592–2596
Khan MM, Ansari SA, Lee J, Cho MH (2013a) Highly visible light active Ag@TiO2 nanocomposites synthesized by electrochemically active biofilm: a novel biogenic approach. Nanoscale 5:4427–4435
Khan MM, Ansari SA, Lee J, Cho MH (2013b) Novel Ag@TiO2 nanocomposite synthesized by electrochemically active biofilm for nonenzymatic hydrogen peroxide sensor. Mater Sci Eng C 33:4692–4699
Khan MM, Kalathil S, Han TH, Lee J, Cho MH (2013c) Positively charged gold nanoparticles synthesized by electrochemically active biofilm—a biogenic pproach. J Nanosci Nanotechnol 13:6079–6085
Khan MM, Lee J, Cho MH (2013d) Electrochemically active biofilm mediated bio-hydrogen production catalyzed by positively charged gold nanoparticles. Int J Hydr Energy 38:5243–5250
Khan MM, Ansari SA, Lee JH, Lee J, Cho MH (2014) Mixed culture electrochemically active biofilms and their microscopic and spectroelectrochemical studies. ACS Sustain Chem Eng 2:423–432
Kim D, An J, Kim B, Jang JK, Kim BH, Chang IS (2012) Scaling-up microbial fuel cells: configuration and potential drop phenomenon at series connection of unit cells in shared anolyte. ChemSusChem 5:1086–1091
Logan BE, Rabaey K (2012) Conversion of wastes into bioelectricity and chemicals by using microbial electrochemical technologies. Science 337:686–690
Logan BE, Murano C, Scott K, Gray ND, Head IM (2005) Electricity generation from cysteine in a microbial fuel cell. Water Res 39:942–952
Pant D, Singh A, Bogaert GV, Olsen SI, Nigam PS, Diels L (2012) Bioelectrochemical systems (BES) for sustainable energy production and product recovery from organic wastes and industrial wastewaters. RSC Adv 2:1248–1263
Rittmann BE, Krajmalnik-Brown R, Halden RU (2008) Pre-genomic, genomic and post-genomic study of microbial communities involved in bioenergy. Nat Rev Microbiol 6:604–612
Rozendal RA, Leonea E, Keller J, Rabaey K (2009) Efficient hydrogen peroxide generation from organic matter in a bioelectrochemical system. Electrochem Commun 11:1752–1755
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Khan, M.M. (2014). Bioenergy Derived from Electrochemically Active Biofilms. In: Hakeem, K., Jawaid, M., Rashid, U. (eds) Biomass and Bioenergy. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-07578-5_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-07578-5_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-07577-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-07578-5
eBook Packages: Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences (R0)