TY - GEN
T1 - New polymeric cathode binders for microbial fuel cells
AU - Saito, Tomonori
AU - Watson, Valerie
AU - Merrill, Matthew D.
AU - Hickner, Michael A.
AU - Logan, Bruce E.
PY - 2009
Y1 - 2009
N2 - A microbial fuel cell (MFC) utilizes a bacteria-laden anode to liberate electrons from organic compounds. Electricity-generating bacteria reside abundantly in domestic wastewater, ocean sediments, animal wastes, etc., making MFC technology a renewable energy technology. In addition to the bacterial anode, the cathode plays a crucial role in MFC performance because of poor kinetics of oxygen reduction and the expensive materials typically used in cathode construction. Polymeric cathode binders with a range of ion contents were examined here for their performance in single chamber air-cathode MFCs. The cathode binder polymers are based on sulfonated poly(phenylsulfone) and therefore much less expensive than Nafion, the standard material used in MFC cathodes. Sulfonated poly(phenylsulfone) binders showed better or equivalent performance to standard Nafion-based cathodes. It is hypothesized that tuning the ion-content of the cathode binder polymer to match the ionic concentration in the MFC buffer can help increase the performance of MFC cathodes.
AB - A microbial fuel cell (MFC) utilizes a bacteria-laden anode to liberate electrons from organic compounds. Electricity-generating bacteria reside abundantly in domestic wastewater, ocean sediments, animal wastes, etc., making MFC technology a renewable energy technology. In addition to the bacterial anode, the cathode plays a crucial role in MFC performance because of poor kinetics of oxygen reduction and the expensive materials typically used in cathode construction. Polymeric cathode binders with a range of ion contents were examined here for their performance in single chamber air-cathode MFCs. The cathode binder polymers are based on sulfonated poly(phenylsulfone) and therefore much less expensive than Nafion, the standard material used in MFC cathodes. Sulfonated poly(phenylsulfone) binders showed better or equivalent performance to standard Nafion-based cathodes. It is hypothesized that tuning the ion-content of the cathode binder polymer to match the ionic concentration in the MFC buffer can help increase the performance of MFC cathodes.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=78649800969&partnerID=8YFLogxK
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:78649800969
SN - 9780841200050
T3 - ACS National Meeting Book of Abstracts
BT - American Chemical Society - 238th National Meeting and Exposition, ACS 2009, Abstracts of Scientific Papers
T2 - 238th National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society, ACS 2009
Y2 - 16 August 2009 through 20 August 2009
ER -
