Electro-Microbiology: A Sustainable Approach for Green Energy

 

Joint Research Collaboration
Sponsor	REPA – Research and Education Promotion Association
Grant Number	P01EN2201JP01
Grant Year	2022
Principal Investigator (PI)	Dr. Danish Mir Sayed Shah
Principal Researcher (PR)	Dr. Manisha Phour
Research Outcome	In progress
Contact	editorial@repa.jp
Biography
	Dr. Manisha Phour obtained her doctorate degree in Microbiology from Chaudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, India. She has experience in the field of microbiology, molecular biology and plant pathology. She also has 3 years post doctoral experience and published more than 25 articles in peer reviewed journals.
Electro-Microbiology: A Sustainable Approach for Green Energy
Purpose and Objective	Energy scarcity and environmental degradation have developed into major worldwide challenges. Due to finite supplies fossil fuels are a non-renewable source of energy and have negative environmental consequences. As a result, developing new technologies for generating alternative and renewable energy is critical. Electro-microbiology has the potential to turn trash into environmentally friendly and sustainable resources. Despite their low power densities, MFCs remain a potential technique of organic waste disposal since they are economically far more sustainable than traditional procedures. Contact between researchers with diverse backgrounds is required to thoroughly examine the new gates in waste to energy issues.
Significance	The electro-microbiology field is making important contributions to the production of biofuels and renewable resources to meet the twenty-first century’s difficulties, which researchers are seeking alternative renewable energy sources. The development of novel technologies to simultaneously improve power output and their transfer into biosynthetic pathways to create valuable chemicals is urgently required. Electro-microbiological systems such as biological energy systems (BESs) can significantly contribute to meeting these difficulties by creating a variety of fuels and chemicals. Biocathodes are crucial to electrosynthesis because they need bacteria to act as an electron source and then catalyze the synthesis of chemicals. Waste CO2 may be utilized as a carbon source in the manufacture of organic molecules, minimizing the need for significant amounts of arable land. This technique can be completely sustainable and carbon neutral if a renewable energy source is employed. A further advantage of microbial aided chemical synthesis using MECs is that it provides a very appealing and unique way for creating valuable compounds from wastewater while also generating power.
Conclusion	Discussion and Conclusion To utilize microorganisms’ unmatched ability to generate electricity a thorough knowledge of the methods by which they do so is essential. Shewanella oneidensis and G. sulfurreducens are two of the well-studied electricigens. Extracellular electron transmission can be promoted in these bacteria (and other electricigens) by either direct electron transfer in which the microbe directly reduces a terminal electron acceptor or by mediated electron transfer in which soluble redox shuttles are used. Multiheme cytochromes on the outer membrane facilitate direct electron transmission, which contact the terminal electron acceptor and assist further electron transfer. Soluble electron shuttles like flavins phenazines and quinones facilitate electron transfer via mediation. These mediators are often redox compounds that bacteria make and release to help in extracellular electron transport. They absorb electrons from the microbe and then transport them to the electrode, where they can restart the electron transfer process. Bacteria such as Shewanella can transmit electrons by direct and mediated electron transfer. Electromicrobiology has a plethora of intriguing future research directions. Our understanding of how microbes contribute electrons to electrodes is still limited, and we know less about how electrons are transferred from electrodes to cells. Electromicrobiology offers the potential to address some of society’s core pressing issues. Although many of the early investigations in Electromicrobiology were motivated by the goal of further optimizing Microbial Fuel Cells for energy harvesting, several other potential possibilities for microbe electrode interactions have appeared recently, and probably more will be envisioned. The sensible development of any of these technologies will be based upon continuous study of electromicrobiology’s fundamental processes.