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Electro-Fermentation Technology: Synthesis of Chemicals and Biofuels
Published in Kuppam Chandrasekhar, Satya Eswari Jujjavarapu, Bio-Electrochemical Systems, 2022
Devashish Tribhuvan, V. Vinay, Saurav Gite, Shadab Ahmed
The process of electro-fermentation has improved the efficiency of substrate conversion remarkably. The recent advancement in this field has enabled us to generate electricity using waste from various sources. The process of microbial electrosynthesis has proved to be an alternative option for the economical mass production of useful chemicals from pure substrates as well as biowastes. Because of the two separate chambers, waste organic matter existing in the anodic chamber does not affect the synthesis of product in the cathodic chamber. EF, because of its several advantages, such as low cost, better efficiency, and solution for several problems faced in the conventional fermentation process, is seen as a potential key process. The future of this technology is broad, and it provides huge opportunities through various applications and integrations with other technologies, thereby stimulating the development of the industry and has a very high capability of being a sustainable approach for the mass production of fuels and other chemicals. However, this technology has some drawbacks that can be resolved with further research and development in this area.
Biofuels Production from Renewable Energy Sources
Published in Debabrata Das, Jhansi L. Varanasi, Fundamentals of Biofuel Production Processes, 2019
Debabrata Das, Jhansi L. Varanasi
Electrofuels are obtained by the combination of photovoltaic cells or solar cells and the bioelectrochemical systems. In case of microbial electrosynthesis, reduced carbon-based chemicals and fuels can be generated using CO2 and electrons from electrodes as carbon and energy sources, respectively (Patil et al. 2015; Bajracharya et al. 2017). These systems are a reverse modification of microbial fuel cells wherein the microorganisms known as electrotrophs that can uptake electron from solid electrodes are used. Currently, this technology is in its nascent stage of research and only a few proof of principle studies have been carried out (Rabaey et al. 2010). Although promising results have been observed, several technical barriers must be overcome for this technology to reach the commercial market.
Microbial Fuel Cell (MFC) Variants
Published in Lakhveer Singh, Durga Madhab Mahapatra, Waste to Sustainable Energy, 2019
Sahriah Basri, Siti Kartom Kamarudin
Microbial electrosynthesis cell is a process that can produce biocommodities from the reduction of substrates with microbial catalysts and an external electron supply (Hyo et al. 2017). This process is expected to become a new application of a cell factory for novel chemical production, wastewater treatment, and carbon capture and utilisation. However, MES is still subject to several problems that need to be overcome for commercialisation; therefore continuous development in the field of metabolic engineering is essential. The development of MES can open up new opportunities for sustainable biocommodity production platforms. Generally, MES offers exclusive environmental and social benefits: organic and inorganic resources, remediation, and recovery of elements (Jhuma 2017, Ali et al. 2017).
Production technologies, current role, and future prospects of biofuels feedstocks: A state-of-the-art review
Published in Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, 2020
Arianna Callegari, Silvia Bolognesi, Daniele Cecconet, Andrea G. Capodaglio
Considering the purpose of this review, the microbial electrosynthesis and the integration of BES with AD should be considered as emerging and promising technologies for biofuel production. Several value-added products have been obtained at the cathode of microbial electrosynthesis systems (MES), including biofuels: ethanol (Speers, Young, & Reguera, 2014; Van Eerten-Jansen, Heijne, Buisman, & Hamelers, 2012), butanol (Kim & Kim, 1988; Zaybak, Pisciotta, Tokash, & Logan, 2013), and propanol (Ganigué, Puig, Batlle-Vilanova, Balaguer, & Colprim, 2015; Torella et al., 2015) were successfully synthetized; it has to be highlighted that the technology is still at laboratory scale. The integration of BES with AD in hybrid systems may lead to several advantages, according to De Vrieze et al. (2018) and Cheng & Kaksonen (2017), due to the possible complementarity of the two technologies: process monitoring, control and stabilization, toxicity and nutrient recovery, effluent polishing and generation of electric energy from the organics contained, biogas upgrading, improvement of feedstocks digestibility, in situ electromethanogenesis. Both MES and BES integration with AD may contribute to the increase of biofuel production in the near future, working in combination or on effluents of the different production technologies to increase overall performance.
The mechanism and application of bidirectional extracellular electron transport in the field of energy and environment
Published in Critical Reviews in Environmental Science and Technology, 2021
Qingqing Xie, Yue Lu, Lin Tang, Guangming Zeng, Zhaohui Yang, Changzheng Fan, Jingjing Wang, Siavash Atashgahi
The inward electron flow from cathode to EAB has also been shown to occur in microbial electrosynthesis (MES) to convert CO2 or other organic matter to value-added chemicals (Tremblay & Zhang, 2015). Several acetogenic microorganisms, such as Clostridium ljungdahlii and Sporomusa ovata, have been well-studied for CO2 reduction to value-added chemicals (Nevin et al., 2010; Nevin et al., 2011). Alongside, experimental evidences suggested that Geobacter and Shewanella species can also play a role in this field. For instance, G. sulfurreducens was shown to reduce CO2 to glycerol using a stainless steel cathode as the sole electron donor (Soussan et al., 2013). It was postulated that G. sulfurreducens initially reduced fumarate to succinate via cathodic electron uptake, and then CO2 in the form of bicarbonate was electrochemically reduced to produce glycerol coupled to succinate consumption (Soussan et al., 2013). Genome annotation revealed that key enzymes for CO2 fixation were present in some Geobacteraceae (Aklujkar et al., 2010). The genome of G. metallireducens encoded all enzymes involved in the dicarboxylate/4-hydroxybutyrate cycle of CO2 fixation (Lovley et al., 2011). Besides, there are reports showing Shewanella species utilized electrons generated from cathode to generate succinate (Ross et al., 2011; Thomas et al., 2013) or allow the conversion of CO2 into value-added products such as formic acid (Le et al., 2018). Genetic manipulation provided a feasible tool to alter the metabolic pathway to expand the capacity of microbial electrosynthesis in Geobacter and Shewanella species (Flynn et al., 2010; La et al., 2017; Ueki, Nevin, Woodard, et al., 2018). Introducing genes that encoded for an ATP-dependent citrate lyase enabled G. sulfurreducens to possess the reverse tricarboxylic acid cycle for the biosynthesis of chemicals from CO2 as precursors with cathode as electron donor (Ueki, Nevin, Woodard, et al., 2018). S. oneidensis MR-1 was engineered to contain ketoisovalerate decarboxylase gene (kivD) and alcohol dehydrogenase gene (adh), enabling it to obtain electron from electrode to enhance the production of isobutanol (La et al., 2017).