Journal of Microbial & Biochemical Technology

Electrochemical investigation of the efficient removal of organic dye: Rational consideration of additional conductivity and substrate in MFC performance

2^nd International Conference and Expo on Water Microbiology & Novel Technologies

August 28-30, 2017 Philadelphia, USA

Masoom Fatima, Robina Farooq, Yohannes Kiros, Rakel W Lindstrom and Darren A Baker

COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Pakistan
Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden
Innventia AB, Sweden

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: J Microb Biochem Technol

Abstract:

Microbial fuel cells (MFCs) cannot only extract bioenergy from a wide range of substrates; including wastewater from animal, domestic, and food processing sources, it can also be used to decompose organic chemicalwaste for instance from textile industry. In this study a low cost MFCwas designed to degrade azo dyes. The cell is aone chamberanaerobic flow cell, using passive air cathodes made from activated carbon-PTFE porous electrodes1 and anodes made from electrospun lignin 2 carbon fiber felt. Ageobacter culture was used to grow the biofilm at the anode. The azo dye Reactive Orange 5 (RO5) was selected on the basis of its toxic nature and chemical structure. In current study, electrochemical performance and degradation efficiency was monitored using electrochemical analysis, UV absorbance and COD analysis. The degraded dye intermediates were identified by UV-HPLC. The influence of concentration of dye, co-substrate (Acetate) and salt on decolorization, COD removal, flow rate and retention time was investigated. At optimal conditions the decolorization was 82% and the COD removal was 59% along with current density upto 0.13 mA/cm2. This new cell configuration has potential to be scaled-up for industrial use due to the application of the low cost materials.