Role of the cathode chamber in microbial electrosynthesis: A comprehensive review of key factors

Abstract

The consumption of non-renewable fossil fuels has directly contributed to a dramatic rise in global carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions, posing an ongoing threat to the ecological security of the Earth. Microbial electrosynthesis (MES) is an innovative energy regeneration strategy that offers a gentle and efficient approach to converting CO₂ into high-value products. The cathode chamber is a vital component of an MES system and its internal factors play crucial roles in improving the performance of the MES system. Therefore, this review aimed to provide a detailed analysis of the key factors related to the cathode chamber in the MES system. The topics covered include inward extracellular electron transfer pathways, cathode materials, applied cathode potentials, catholyte pH, and reactor configuration. In addition, this review analyzes and discusses the challenges and promising avenues for improving the conversion of CO₂ into high-value products via MES.

Keywords

Microbial electrosynthesis / Energy regeneration / CO₂ reduction / Cathode chamber / Electroactive bacteria

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Ting Cai: Writing - original draft, Visualization, Validation, Methodology, Investigation, Data curation. Xinyu Gao: Writing - review & editing, Conceptualization. Xiaoyan Qi: Visualization, Methodology. Xiaolei Wang: Validation, Investigation. Ruijun Liu: Formal analysis, Data curation. Lei Zhang: Validation, Data curation. Xia Wang: Writing - review & editing, Supervision, Resources, Project administration, Conceptualization.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (32070097 and 91951202) and National Key Research and Development Program of China (2019YFA0904800).

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