Abstract
Fungi are among the microorganisms able to generate electricity as a result of their metabolic processes. Throughout the last several years, a large number of papers on various microorganisms for current production in microbial fuel cells (MFCs) have been published; however, fungi still lack sufficient evaluation in this regard. In this review, we focus on fungi, paying special attention to their potential applicability to MFCs. Fungi used as anodic or cathodic catalysts, in different reactor configurations, with or without the addition of an exogenous mediator, are described. Contrary to bacteria, in which the mechanism of electron transfer is pretty well known, the mechanism of electron transfer in fungi-based MFCs has not been studied intensively. Thus, here we describe the main findings, which can be used as the starting point for future investigations. We show that fungi have the potential to act as electrogens or cathode catalysts, but MFCs based on bacteria–fungus interactions are especially interesting. The review presents the current state-of-the-art in the field of MFC systems exploiting fungi.
Highlights
The technology known as microbial fuel cells (MFCs) has been intensively developed over the last two decades, due to its great potential for clean energy production in the form of electric current [1,2]
The highest power densities obtained for S. cerevisiae-based MFCs reached 1.5 Wm−2 when methylene blue (MB) was used as a mediator in a dual-chamber reactor
S. cerevisiae-based single-chamber MFC was 334 mWm−2 when a carbon nanotube-based electrode modified with PEI was used
Summary
The technology known as microbial fuel cells (MFCs) has been intensively developed over the last two decades, due to its great potential for clean energy production in the form of electric current [1,2]. Laccases are a group of N-glycosylated blue oxidases that contain four copper atoms localized in distinct binding sites within the active site These enzymes are able to catalyze the oxidation of phenolic compounds and aromatic amines by utilizing atmospheric oxygen as the electron acceptor [17]. It was found that CDH uses the CYT domain for direct electron transfer from substrate to anode In this regard, the CYT domain plays the role of a mediator and eliminates the need for adding an exogenous mediator during the oxidation processes [38,39]. Fungi have been used in the MFC systems in two main modes (Figure 1): In the anode (electron transfer is realized directly, through redox-active fungal proteins or through chemical mediators facilitating the electron transport) or in the cathode (fungi are the source of enzymes catalyzing the reduction of a terminal electron acceptor, mainly oxygen).
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