A novel ethanol/oxygen microfluidic fuel cell with enzymes immobilized onto cantilevered porous electrodes

[摘要] This paper introduces a novel design of membraneless microfluidic biofuel cell that incorporates three-dimensional porous electrodes containing immobilized enzymes to catalyze redox reactions occurring in the presence of ethanol/O2co-laminar flows. In order to maximize the penetration depth of the reactants inside the porous medium, we report on the preliminary evaluation of cantilevered bioelectrodes, namely the fibrous electrodes protrude along the internal walls of the miniature electrochemical chamber. As a first proof-of-concept, we demonstrate the integration of a bioanode and a biocathode into a lamination-based microfluidic cell fabricated via rapid prototyping. With enzymes deposited into the fibrous structure of 25 mm long, 1 mm wide and 0.11 mm thick carbon paper electrodes, the volumetric power density reached 1.25 mW cm-3at 0.43 V under a flow rate of 50 μL min-1. An advantage of the presented microfluidic biofuel cell is that it can be adapted to include a larger active electrode volume via the vertical stacking of multiple thin bioelectrodes. We therefore envision that our design would be amenable to reach the level of net power required to supply energy to a plurality of low-consumption electronic devices.

[发布机构] Institut Européen des Membranes, UMR 5635, ENSCM-UMII-CNRS, place Eugène Bataillon, Montpellier; 34095, France^1;Now at Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT), Center for Biomolecular Nanotechnologies, Via Barsanti, Arnesano, Lecce; 73010, Italy^2;Université de Lyon, Institut des Nanotechnologies de Lyon INL-UMR5270, CNRS, Université Lyon 1, Villeurbanne; F-69622, France^3

[效力级别] 能源学

[关键词] Active electrodes;Electronic device;Fibrous structures;Immobilized enzyme;Microfluidic cell;Microfluidic fuel cell;Three-dimensional porous electrodes;Volumetric power density