Editorial: Microbial Fuel Cells and Microbial Electrochemistry: Into the Next Century!

Abstract

In the year 1911 the first publication appeared that reported on electrochemical effects caused by the activity of microorganisms. This study is considered as the hour or birth of microbial fuel cells (MFCs). MFCs are the archetype microbial bioelectrochemical system (BES), which produce electricity from microbially catalyzed anodic oxidation processes. The greatest potential of MFCs lies in the use of wastewater as fuel, which allows combining wastewater treatment and energy recovery. Since that first study more than hundred years of development have passed. Yet, it has only been during the last ten years that microbial fuel cell research started to develop an impressive momentum (see Figure 1). Thus, since the year 2002 the number of publications has been increasing almost exponentially. New types of microbial BESs have been proposed, including microbial electrolysis cells (Figure 2) and microbial desalination cells. The research field has developed from a scientific peculiarity into an increasingly differentiated, highly dynamic, Full text: