Abstract

We have developed upflow microbial fuel cells (UMFC) that simultaneously can clean wastewater and produce electricity. By sufficiently utilizing the inner volume of the anode and minimizing the space between electrodes the power output of the UMFC was improved from 3 to 25 W/m3. We are also working on harvesting electric energy from natural waters (e.g. river and ocean), with a novel design of a rotating cathode in a sediment microbial fuel cell to improve oxygen availability to the cathode. Finally, we have adopted a bacterium found in the normal human gut microbial community whose genome has been sequenced as a model anode biocatalyst to study its genomic variations using DNA chips.

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