Improvement of bioelectrochemical property and energy recovery by acylhomoserine lactones (AHLs) in microbial electrolysis cells (MECs)

Abstract

Quorum sensing (QS) has been extensively studied as a cell–cell communication system, where small chemical signal molecules (acylhomoserine lactones, AHLs) can regulate the bacterial communications in bioelectrochemical systems via chemical signaling and electric signaling. In this study, electrochemical activity of bio-anode is substantially promoted by adding two kinds of AHLs with different chain length at the stage of community formation in microbial electrolysis cells (MECs). Hydrogen yield increase is observed by adding of two chain length AHLs, 3-oxo-hexanoyl-homoserine lactone (3OC6-HSL) and 3-oxo-dodecanoyl homoserine lactone (3OC12-HSL). A higher MEC current is acquired with addition of 3OC6-HSL than 3OC12-HSL at a fixed voltage of 0.8 V (vs. SHE). The highest yield is up to 3.8 ± 0.2 mol H2 mol−1 acetate at 10 μM 3OC6-HSL, which is increased 29% over control MECs. Evaluated on applied voltage, energy efficiency is increased to 171.6 ± 21.3% with short chain AHL, however, no significant improvement is performed on energy efficiency and coulombic efficiency with long-chain AHL. The study shows that bioelectrochemical characteristics of MECs varied on the chain length of AHL signal molecules and short-chain AHLs have a more positive effect on electron transfer and energy recovery in MECs.