Abstract
Electrogenicity, or bacterial electron transfer capacity, is an important application which offers environmentally sustainable advances in the fields of biofuels, wastewater treatment, bioremediation, desalination, and biosensing. Significant boosts in this technology can be achieved with the growth of synthetic biology that manipulates microbial electron transfer pathways, thereby potentially significantly improving their electrogenic potential. There is currently a need for a high-throughput, rapid, and highly sensitive test array to evaluate the electrogenic properties of newly discovered and/or genetically engineered bacterial species. In this work, we report a single-sheet, paper-based electrofluidic (incorporating both electronic and fluidic structure) screening platform for rapid, sensitive, and potentially high-throughput characterization of bacterial electrogenicity. This novel screening array uses (i) a commercially available wax printer for hydrophobic wax patterning on a single sheet of paper and (ii) water-dispersed electrically conducting polymer mixture, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):polystyrene sulfonate, for full integration of electronic and fluidic components into the paper substrate. The engineered 3-D, microporous, hydrophilic, and conductive paper structure provides a large surface area for efficient electron transfer. This results in rapid and sensitive power assessment of electrogenic bacteria from a microliter sample volume. We validated the effectiveness of the sensor array using hypothesis-driven genetically modified Pseudomonas aeruginosa mutant strains. Within 20 min, we observed that the sensor platform successfully measured the electricity-generating capacities of five isogenic mutants of P. aeruginosa while distinguishing their differences from genetically unmodified bacteria.
Highlights
Electromicrobiology, a field that evaluates the electricity-producing capacity or “electrogenicity” of various bacteria, contributes to novel technologies that address pressing societal issues concerning energy security, environmental protection, bioremediation, and economic development (Rittmann, 2008; Lovley, 2012; Wang et al, 2015)
Paper-Based Microbial Fuel Cell Arrays environmentally important functions, such as water desalination, bioremediation, and toxicity detection (Borole et al, 2011; Schröder, 2011; Wang and Ren, 2013; Schröder et al, 2015). These bacterial capabilities have entered a new phase of development with biotechniques in synthetic biology that physiologically and genetically predict and manipulate bacterial metabolic pathways to improve their electrogenic potential (Rabaey et al, 2009; Alfonta, 2010; Yong et al, 2012, 2014; TerAvest and Ajo-Franklin, 2016)
Microbial synthetic biology will aid in the development of fundamentally different strategies to advance electromicrobiology by maximizing the inherent electrontransferring capability of bacteria, translating the technology from the laboratory setting to practical applications
Summary
Paper-Based Microbial Fuel Cell Arrays environmentally important functions, such as water desalination, bioremediation, and toxicity detection (Borole et al, 2011; Schröder, 2011; Wang and Ren, 2013; Schröder et al, 2015). These bacterial capabilities have entered a new phase of development with biotechniques in synthetic biology that physiologically and genetically predict and manipulate bacterial metabolic pathways to improve their electrogenic potential (Rabaey et al, 2009; Alfonta, 2010; Yong et al, 2012, 2014; TerAvest and Ajo-Franklin, 2016). Many of the available technologies that could be used are not capable of quickly, simultaneously, and sensitively screening the electrogenicity of bacteria in a low-volume sample
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