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Desalination 349 (2014) 94101

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Desalination
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/desal

PPy/AQS (9, 10-anthraquinone-2-sulfonic acid) and PPy/ARS


(Alizarin Red's) modied stainless steel mesh as cathode membrane in
an integrated MBR/MFC system
Yaojie Li a, Lifen Liu a,b,c,, Jiadong Liu a, Fenglin Yang a, Nanqi Ren c
a
Key Laboratory of Industrial Ecology and Environmental Engineering (MOE), School of Environmental Science and Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China
b
School of Food and Environmental Science and Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Panjin, China
c
State Key Lab of Urban Water Resource and Environment, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150001, China

H I G H L I G H T S

PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS and PPy successfully modied SSM were tested in MBR/MFC for the rst time.
The modied SSMs function as conductive membranes and catalytic cathodes.
The modication of SSM improved MB degradation and antifouling properties.
The modication of SSM improved electricity generation by 2030 times.
The MBR/MFC with modied SSM has higher efuent quality and treatment efciency.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: To increase efuent quality and membrane ux, membrane bioreactor was integrated with microbial fuel cell
Received 10 April 2014 (MBR/MFC), in which functional cathode membranes could enable fouling reduction and even electro-catalytic
Received in revised form 24 June 2014 pollutant degradation using the bio-generated electricity. Modifying stainless steel mesh (SSM) with only poly-
Accepted 25 June 2014
pyrrole (PPy) or cheap ARS (Alizarin Red's) or expensive AQS (9,10-anthraquinone-2-sulfonic acid) doped PPy
Available online 12 July 2014
lm, helped obtain high ORR (oxygen reduction reaction) activity and higher power output in the integrated
Keywords:
MBR/MFC system. The ARS and PPy modied cathode membranes, could not only increase the degradation of
Stainless steel mesh (MB) methylene blue (N 90%, 1 h), but also enable higher antifouling property in ltrations. Most importantly, re-
Cathode membrane modication placing the blank SSM, the use of PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS and PPy modied SSM, increased power density 31.37, 27.06
Wastewater treatment and 23.7 times respectively in the integrated MBR/MFC system. The new system has great application potential
MBR/MFC and economic feasibility in effective removal of COD and NH+ 4 -N nutrients, has better efuent qualities and has
higher energy recovery.
2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction According to previous studies [4,5], minute electric elds can be


used in reducing membrane fouling in MBR and microbial fuel cell
Membrane bioreactor (MBR) is a device equipped with membrane (MFC) can provide such an electric eld. MBR integrated MFC is quite
in a bio-reactor [1], it has many advantages due to its high efuent qual- a promising technology in wastewater treatment and electricity
ity, small space occupation and high degree of automation. However, production. It can directly extract electricity from diverse organic
the intensive energy consumption for aeration and membrane fouling wastes through bio-electrochemical activities [6]. Many studies inte-
are the main problems restricting its wide application [2,3]. So it's ur- grating MBR with MFC were successfully conducted [79]. In a bio-
gent to nd a new technology to offset the energy consumption or re- electrochemical MBR-MFC reactor, the maximum power density of
duce the cost of membrane. 4.35 W/m3 was obtained, using stainless steel mesh as both the cathode
and the ltration material [8]. Another design used cost effective mate-
rials (carbon felt) as the cathode and a maximum power density of
Corresponding author at: Key Laboratory of Industrial Ecology and Environmental 6.0 W/m3 was obtained by inserting MFC into MBR [9].
Engineering (MOE), School of Food and Environmental Science and Technology, School
of Environmental Science and Technology, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian
To improve energy output in MFC, some researchers focused on de-
116024, China. Tel.: +86 411 84706173; fax: +86 411 84708083. veloping air-breathing MFCs equipped with stainless steel mesh as the
E-mail address: lifenliu@dlut.edu.cn (L. Liu). cathode catalyst support, as it is more conductive and adjustable, in

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.desal.2014.06.027
0011-9164/ 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101 95

AQS ARS
Fig. 1. The chemical structures of ARS and AQS.

addition to its low cost [10,11]. Others [1214] studied cathode cata- a thin lm formed by electro-polymerization in a three-electrode elec-
lysts, such as MnOx [12,14] and Pt-Fe [13], CoNPc [15] and carbon nano- trochemical cell. It was carried out on a CHI600E electrochemical work-
tube [16]. Anthraquinone-2,6-disulfonate (AQDS) [17] can accelerate station (Shanghai Chenhua Instrument Company, China) connected to a
electron transfer and cathode reactions (ORR) in fuel cell. Developing computer, with a saturated calomel electrode (SCE) as reference
effective catalyst on cathode membrane is critical for the integration electrode and a Pt sheet (10 10 mm) as counter electrode, respectively.
of MFC with MBR. The electro-polymerization was conducted following similar procedures
PPy was mainly used as a substrate in catalysis for its interesting as described in reference [21]. Pyrrole was puried by distillation prior
properties such as good conductivity and environmental stability, bio- to use. A constant potential of 0.8 V was applied for the anodic electro-
compatibility [18] and the catalytic activity towards ORR [19]. It can polymerization in a non-stirred N2-saturated solution containing 0.1 M
be a good alternative to Pt in MFCs due to economic advantages. MFC pyrrole (Aldrich) and 5 mM AQS (Aladdin) or ARS (Sinopharm Chemical
equipped with polypyrrole/anthraquinone-2-sulfonate (PPy/AQS) Reagent Co., Ltd). The time required for the electro-polymerization pro-
lm-modied stainless steel mesh cathode could generate power at cess was 15 min. For comparison, PPy-only lm was electrochemically
density of 575 mW/m2[20]. In a dual-chamber microbial fuel cell formed on the mesh electrode without the dopants, using a solution con-
(MFC), polypyrrole (PPy)/anthraquinone-2,6-disulfonate (AQDS) con- taining 0.1 M pyrrole and 5 mM sodium sulfate.
ductive lm can be used as cathode and anode [21]. However, no one The freshly coated PPy/AQS-and/or PPy/ARS stainless steel mesh
is using them as membrane modules and applying them in the integrat- was thoroughly rinsed with distilled water to remove the remaining
ed MFC/MBR system. That's why we put forward our research. pyrrole monomer and the supporting electrolyte, and then air-dried at
In this study, the modication of stainless steel mesh was realized room temperature. The properties of modied cathode membrane ma-
via constant-potential anodic electro-polymerization of pyrrole. terials were listed in Table 1. The surface morphology of the modied
During the modication, lm of PPy doped with expensive AQS membrane electrodes were examined with scanning electronic micros-
(9,10-anthraquinone-2-sulfonic acid sodium salt) or cheap ARS copy (SEM) (QUANTA 450, UK).
(3,4-dihydroxy-9,10-anthraquinone-2-sulfonic acid sodium salt, Alizarin The blank SSM was cleaned ultrasonically and then degreased in ac-
Red's), was formed on SSM and used as cathode catalysts. PPy and anthra- etone and ethanol successively (each for 2 h), followed by rinsing with
quinone sulfonate dopants were chosen as they can be coated onto the distilled water. And the newly prepared membranes was dipped into
SSM membrane quite rmly through electro-polymerization. To lower distilled water for 20 min and then air-dried for 24 h before being test-
the cost, ARS (98 per kg), a typical anthraquinone dye, widely used in tex- ed. Cyclic voltammetry (CV) tests were performed in 0.1 M Na2SO4 so-
tile industry and biochemical assay, was tested. It is much cheaper than lution by using the modied SSM membrane as the working electrode,
AQS (1078 $ kg1). The modied electrodes were tested in degrading an SCE as the reference electrode and a Pt sheet as the counter electrode.
MB in solution to compare their catalytic properties. Then, they were test- The scan range was between 0.9 V and +0.6 V and the scan rate was
ed in integrated MFC/MBR batch system to achieve higher power densi- 10 mV s1.
ties and better antifouling performance at the same time.
2.2. Experimentalelectro-catalysis and anti-fouling properties
2. Materials and methods
The electro-catalysis experiments were performed at room temper-
2.1. Cathode fabrication and characterization ature, using a three-electrode system, a beaker and CHI 600E electro-
chemical workstation (Shanghai Chenhua Instrument Company,
A piece of stainless steel mesh (purchased from Shanghai Suita Filter China). The modied cathode electrode was used as the working elec-
Material Co., Ltd. China) was used as the substrate membrane (pore size trode whereas SCE and a Pt sheet (10 10 mm) were used as the refer-
15 m). Prior to use, the SSM was cleaned ultrasonically and then ence and counter electrodes respectively. The reaction system had
degreased in acetone and ethanol successively (each for 2 h), followed 100 mL solution, with an initial concentration of 5 mg L1 methylene
by rinsing with distilled water. Anthraquinone sulfonates AQS and blue (MB, C16H18ClN3S 3H2O, Shenyang reagents) and 0.05 mol L1
ARS were chosen as target dopants. Their structures were shown in Na2SO4 as the supporting electrolyte. Air was bubbled into the solution
Fig. 1. The PPy/AQS and PPy/ARS were coated on the SSM electrode as at an aeration rate of 60 mL min1 during the degradation process. The

Table 1
Properties of differently modied SSM cathode membranes.

Membrane Resistance (/cm) Weight increase (mg/cm2) Water ux (L h1 m2) Average ux reduction F/F0

SSM 1.1 0.1 1433.3 11.1 1


PPy-coated SSM 3.0 0.2 3.4 0.4 1411.1 11.1 0.98
PPy/ARS-coated SSM 3.8 0.5 3.9 0.2 1222.2 22.2 0.85
PPy/AQS-coated SSM 3.3 0.3 5.3 0.3 1138.9 5.6 0.78
96 Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101

pH was adjusted to 3 with 0.5 M H2SO4 solution and cathode voltage To evaluate power performance of the system, the anode and cathode
was at 0.4 V. The MB concentrations were analyzed by measuring polarization curves and the cell power density curves were obtained
the absorbance at 665 nm using a visible spectrophotometer 722E by varying the external resistor over the range from 10,000 to 5
(Shanghai Spectrum Instruments Co., Ltd, China). when the performance of MFC approached steady state. Current Inten-
Additionally, in order to determine the anti-fouling properties of the sity (I) was calculated as I = U (cell voltage)/R (external resistance),
modied cathode membrane, ltrations and anti-fouling experiments and power (P) was calculated as P = U I. Both I and P were normalized
were carried out. The vessel for the experiments had a volume of 2 L to the projected area of cathode surface (27 cm2) to evaluate current
and the aeration rate was kept at 0.2 m3/h. The effective permeate and power density respectively. The anode potential was measured by
membrane area was 27 cm2. The freshly prepared PPy/AQS and PPy/ inserting an SCE electrode into the anode chamber; the cathode poten-
ARS modied SSM were tested in ltrating yeast suspension solution, tial was calculated as the sum of the anode potential and the cell voltage.
simulating mixed liquor suspended solids (MLSS) in MBR (MLSS = The HRT of the anode chamber was calculated from the net effective vol-
0.5 g/L), while the unmodied and only PPy modied membrane ume of the anodic chamber and inuent ow rate.
were also compared. In all experiments, the MBRs were operated in a The ammonium nitrogen (NH+ 4 -N), chemical oxygen demand
gravitational ltration mode at constant trans-membrane pressure (COD), total phosphorus (TP), turbidity (NTU), and mixed liquor
(TMP) 4.5 kPa, so they have the same water head drop (Z = 450 mm). suspended solids (MLSS) were measured according to the standard
The permeate ux (F) was calculated though the equation F = q/ methods [22]. The pH value was tested in a pH meter (CT-6021A).
(At), where t is the time interval, A is the area of the membrane, and
q is the volume of the collected permeate during the time interval of 3. Results and discussion
every 5 min. Each experiment lasts for one hour. The t/VV curves belong
to classical ltration model and the slopes of the curves can be used for 3.1. SEM
comparing the ltration capacity of different membrane modules.
The SEM images of the stainless steel mesh (SSM) and the modied
2.3. The Batch MBR/MFC experiments SSM samples with electro-synthesized coating of PPy, PPy/ARS and PPy/
AQS are shown in Fig. 3. For the composite electrodes, small particle size
The setup of the experiment is shown in Fig. 2. The MFC/MBR system and high porosity are desirable because these features enable more sur-
consisted of two chambers. One cylinder anode chamber with an effec- face active sites for redox reactions. The morphology of PPy, PPy/AQS
tive volume of 100 mL was set in the middle and the surrounding annu- and PPy/ARS on SSM clearly exhibits a rough and granular surface fea-
lar space was the cathode chamber. The anode chamber was lled with ture, similar to Ref. [23]. The surface of PPy/AQS and PPy/ARS lms is
granular activated carbon, with a graphite rod (d = 5 cm) inserted to even rougher, with larger granule feature. The conductivity is higher
collect electricity. The anode chamber wall had many holes and was for the doped PPy modied SSM than the PPy only modied SSM. Addi-
wrapped with lter cloth. The cathode chamber (800 mL) had active tionally, the PPy/ARS, PPy/AQS and PPy coated on SSM could not be re-
sludge (initial concentration of 1000 mg/L) and was aerated (air ow moved, even under intensive wiping, indicating that the interaction
0.2 L/min). The anode was inoculated with sludge from a reactor that between the coated lms and the SSM was very strong and intensive.
had been operated for a long-term with stable electricity generation. It is favorable for bacteria attachment and biolm formation as anodes
Wastewater was pumped into the anode chamber from the top by a in MFCs, it is also a good cathode and ltration material. The physical
peristaltic pump, and then the wastewater permeated through the lter properties of the modied membrane electrodes can be found in
cloth into the cathode chamber. The efuent was drawn out by pump Table 1. It is clear that the conductivity and water ux did not change
and ltrated through the cathode membrane module. The output volt- much after the modication. The average ux reduction for PPy/AQS
age across a 500 external resistor was automatically recorded every modied SSM is 0.779. It is clear that the PPy/AQS coating has much
30 min using a data acquisition system (PISO-813, Taiwan). more dense structure, they polymerize on the coarse surface of the
The composition of the synthetic wastewater was: 0.4 g/L sucrose, base membrane instead of around the steel wires. The larger the pore
0.05 g/L NH4Cl, 0.015 g/L KH2PO4, 0.01 g/L MgSO4 and 0.01 g/L CaCl2. size is, the more easily membrane fouling happens. The chemical

Data acquisition system

Anode
R

Reference Influent
electrode
graphite rod
effluent

Membrane module
(cathode)

Activated
sludge

Aeration

Fig. 2. The set-up of MBR/MFC system.


Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101 97

B1 C1
C1 D1

B2 C2 D2

Fig. 3. SEM images of cathode membrane electrode with different magnication. (A) unmodied stainless steel mesh (1000), B1B2; C1C2; D1D2, the PPy, PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS, 1 and 2
corresponds to 4000 and 8000 magnication respectively.

substances may block the gaps in SSM membrane. When it was not too reduction peak appeared on the CV with PPy at approximate 0.57 V
serious, it still has a good ltration ux as a membrane module. in O2 saturated solution. The value is quite similar to the reported liter-
ature of 0.6 V [19]. It can be seen that the incorporation of different
3.2. Cyclic voltammograms (CVs) anthraquinone sulfonate species in PPy matrix signicantly improves
the current generation over a broader potential range, compared with
To investigate the effect of incorporation of PPy, AQS and ARS in the bare SSM, and increases ORR activity in the presence of oxygen. It also
SSM substrate, the CV curves were measured (Fig. 4). An oxygen suggests the enhancement of specic capacitance because of the

Fig. 4. Cyclic voltammograms of (a) PPy-SO42-, (b) PPy/ARS and (c) PPy/AQS modied SSM compared with bare SSM in 0.1 M Na2SO4 solution saturated with N2 or O2 .
98 Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101

increased surface area of the three kinds of electrodes. For PPy/ARS, it activity and improved the stability greatly. Thanks to the stronger bond-
improved most signicantly. The other reason for current improvement ing, the electrodes can be used many times without worrying the loss of
is the oxygen reduction on the electrodes. the catalyst.
To investigate further the ORR catalytic activity, both the membrane
cathodes were tested under O2 or N2 saturated conditions. For the PPy/
ARS coated SSM, the reduction peak appears at potential of 0.67 V 3.3.2. The SSM modication improved ltration permeability
while the PPy/AQS coated SSM is 0.73 V and 0.5 V. The additional The t/VV curves of different cathode membrane electrodes are
redox peaks are observed at potentials negative to the redox potential shown in Fig. 6a. It shows that the slopes of modied membranes are
of PPy. It was reported similarly in the literature [23,24]. These addition- smaller than that of stainless steel mesh. The slope is an indicator of
al redox peaks are associated with oxidationreduction processes of membrane fouling. From the gure, the slope of the PPy, PPy/AQS and
hydroanthraquinone/anthraquinone groups. It demonstrates the pres- the PPy/ARS is 73, 52 and 57, while that of the unmodied stainless
ence of the anthraquinone sulfonate species in PPy substrate. mesh was 81. So the PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS membrane modules have supe-
rior performance than the other two kinds of membrane modules. There
3.3. Electro-catalysis and ltration performance are two models about membrane fouling [26]. For our modied mem-
branes the classical ltration model ts well, the higher the slope, the
3.3.1. The electro-catalytic degradation of MB higher the membrane fouling, and the more decrease in accumulated
In Fig. 5b, the removal rate of MB by electro-catalysis using different permeation volume. It happened because the membrane pore size
cathode membrane was shown, being faster using PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS was initially narrowed down by the particles to be ltrated, and then
and PPy modied SSM electrodes than the unmodied SSM. The reason the deposit particles started to form a cake layer on membrane surface
is that catalyst doping increased reaction rates by reducing the activa- and decreased the ux. In Fig. 6b, the regularity in the ux changes in
tion energy. MB molecules can be oxidized by H2O2 species generated the three cycles yeast ltration test was shown.
from the modied cathode with promoted oxygen reduction while an- The ux of modied membrane was much smaller than the blank
thraquinone sulfonate dopants work as catalysts [25], or by OH radicals membrane in the rst ltration cycle. This is caused by the coating of
generated from anode. PPy, PPy/AQS and PPy/ARS, blocking the open gap on stainless steel
A high degradation rate was maintained for the modied electrode mesh, resulted in a much smaller pore size (Table 1). From the three l-
after several cycles, indicating a good stability (Fig. 5a) and high catalyt- tration results, it is shown that the modication of the membranes can
ic activity. The removal rate (N94%) and stability for PPy/AQS modied
electrode were a little higher than the other three, suggesting that the
modied membrane is feasible for practical operation. The immobiliza-
tion of AQS or ARS into PPy matrix increased the electrochemical

Fig. 6. The t/VV curves (a) of different cathode membrane electrodes and Permeate ux
Fig. 5. The stability of the modied membrane electrodes (a) and the removal rate of MB of stainless steel mesh, PPy, PPy/ARS and PPy/AQS membrane electrodes applying in three
by electro-catalysis of cathode membrane electrode (b). ltration cycles (b).
Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101 99

achieve much better permeation than the unmodied one, better anti-
fouling properties, plus higher ORR in MFC/MBR system.

3.4. Cell voltage, power output and polarization curve

In order to verify and explore the effects of modied membrane elec-


trodes, the MBR/MFC was operated using the same cell structure and
anode system but various modied cathode membranes. It's clear that
the system cell voltage was only 0.03 V for SSM, but 0.13 V, 0.12 V and
0.11 V respectively for PPy/AQS, PPy/ARS and PPy modied SSM
(Fig. 7). The low voltage generation can be attributed to the fact that
there is only one graphite rod to collect electricity. Poor collection of
the electricity generated may lead to lower current. Another reason
was that the anode chamber was not strictly anaerobic with the polyes-
ter lter cloth as separator. But this lter separator facilitated proton
transfer by permeation without using ion exchange membrane. Though
the power output is small, it proved that the modication increased
electricity generation (Fig. 8).
The power densities and polarization curves are indicators of the
performance of MBR/MFC. As shown in Fig. 8, using the unmodied
SSM membrane, the maximum power density is just 0.5 mW m 2
(the surface area was the projected cathode membrane area) or
13.61 mW m 3 (based on the volume of the anode chamber). In
contrast, for the PPy/AQS modied SSM, it is 15.87 mW m 2
(428.49 mW m 3 ), for PPy/ARS and PPy modied SSM, it is
13.53 mW m2 (328.05 mW m3), 11.85 mW m2 (320 mW m 3)
respectively. The increase of power densities demonstrates that modi-
ed membranes performed better catalytic ORR activity than the blank
SSM membrane. The PPy/AQS coating increased power density by
31.74 times compared with the blank SSM, while the PPy/ARS and PPy
coating increased 27.06 times and 23.7 times. The ARS coating is quite
cost-effective in terms of enhanced power generation.
Additionally, the enhancement of cathode performance was mainly
responsible for the boost of power performance. It was conrmed by
the anode and cathode polarization curves (Fig. 8b). From the anode po-
larization curves, there were insignicant variations in the anode open
circuit potentials (OCPs) and working potentials. In contrast, the varia- Fig. 8. The power density curves (a) and anode, cathode polarization curves (b) of differ-
tions in the cathode OCPs and cathode working potentials were pro- ent cathode membrane electrodes.

nounced depending on cathode modules with different catalysts.


chamber, are shown in Fig. 9, indicating good COD and NH+ 4 -N removal
3.5. The efuent qualities efciencies. Both the COD and NH+ 4 -N removal rate can reach N95% at
the end. TP removal became higher as the system operation continued
For wastewater treatment systems, it is vital to evaluate the removal reaching a very high removal rate in the end. COD removal increased
efciencies of COD, nutrient and other parameters. The changes of COD when modied SSM was used. It is mainly attributed to the respiration
and NH+ 4 -N, TP, pH and NTU with different cathode membrane mod- of heterotrophic bacteria, a little part to the electro-catalytic oxidation.
ules, at the hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 1.2 h in the anode NH+ 4 -N removal remains stable. The TP removal was higher after several
cycles of treatment as the MLSS increased in the system.
One can notice quite remarkably that the COD and NH+ 4 -N removal
in the anaerobic efuent treatment is also very high. This is due to the
fact that the anode chamber could not be made extremely anaerobic.
And some electro-microorganisms are facultative aerobes. They can sur-
vive well in the anaerobic and aerobic environment well, and consume
COD and nutrients. The removal rate increased when cathode activity
increased, because of the increased electron transfer efciency.
After treatment, the turbidity of the efuent is below 2 NTU without
odor. It suggested that this kind of membrane module can be useful in
actual practice. The efuent pH is around 78 which meets the dis-
charge standard.
Compared with other MFC system, the nal efuent quality is
higher, as shown by comparison with following reported data. One of
the rst tests exploring domestic wastewater treatment using an air
cathode MFC with graphite rods demonstrated a total COD removal of
about 50% at the HRT = 6 h [27]. A power density of 464 mW m 2
(15.5 W m3) and 40%50% COD removal was achieved by wastewater
ow through the carbon cloth anode [28]. And domestic wastewater
Fig. 7. A cell voltagetime curve with an external resistance of 500 . treatment was examined under two different temperatures and ow
100 Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101

Fig. 9. The properties of the inuent and the (anaerobic or aerobic) efuent in MBR/MFC system.

modes, with the highest power densities (422 mW m2, 12.8 W m3), PPy/ARS and PPy modied SSM cathode membrane. The modied
but COD removal was only 25.8% [29]. membrane material may also work as anode in the MBR/MFC system.
Overall, the advantages of this MFC/MBR system were shown in the
following aspects. (1) Cheap lter cloth worked as separator, without 4. Conclusion
using an ion exchange membrane. (2) The relatively low cost cathode
membrane had higher ORR activity. (3) Higher efuent quality was ob- In this paper, PPy, PPy/AQS and PPy/ARS lm were successfully
tained by ltering through the cathode membrane after sequential an- electro-polymerized and coated onto the stainless steel mesh at
aerobic and aerobic treatment. (4) The electro-catalytically active ORR constant anodic potential using 0.5 M pyrrole and 5 mM AQS or ARS.
electrode may generate oxidizing species to degrade chemical pollutant For the rst time, they are used in MBR/MFC system as cost-effective
in wastewater, for safer or less risky efuent, exert an germicidal activity catalysts. The novelty and benets of the integrated MFC/MBR using
and further enhance antifouling property of the modied SSM mem- the modied cathode membrane are shown by the higher efuent qual-
brane. (5) Higher power output can be obtained using the PPy/AQS, ity, higher treatment efciency and 2030 times higher electricity
Y. Li et al. / Desalination 349 (2014) 94101 101

generation. These advantages promise the use of the membrane elec- [13] J.N. Zhang, S.J. You, Y.X. Yuan, Q.L. Zhao, G.D. Zhang, Efcient electrocatalysis of ca-
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Acknowledgments [16] Y.P. Zhang, J. Sun, Y.Y. Hu, S.Z. Li, Q. Xu, Carbon nanotube-coated stainless steel mesh
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This research was supported by China National Natural Science 239 (2013) 169174.
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