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Design and development of unconventional catalytic conversion processes using electrons, photons, and microorganisms

Problem statement

Our long-term commitment to sustainability and a circular carbon economy involves unconventional catalytic conversion processes. We study various processes assisted by electrons, photons, or microorganisms to produce biofuels, chemicals, electricity, or treated water. For example, bio-electro-chemical systems, including microbial fuel cells (MFCs), electrolysis cells (MECs), and photo-assisted cells (PA-MECs), are promising technologies to simultaneously produce renewable energy and clean wastewater using active microorganisms as biocatalysts.

Our work aims to synthesize multi-functional catalysts and reactors to enhance electrical conductivity, photo-efficiency, microbiological affinity, porosity, hydrophilicity, and surface area for carbonaceous electrodes. We work with materials such as graphene oxide, metallic nanoparticles, nitride and carbide basic materials, and MXenes.

We consider new platform technologies to produce renewable biofuel and chemicals and treat wastewater using the nanotechnology and reaction engineering approach as an innovative combination to increase the productivity of these processes.

Goals

  • Develop and scale up electro-photo-bio-catalyst and -reactors
  • Propose novel processes to clean wastewater and produce electricity, chemicals, and bio-hydrogen
  • Model and simulate fuel cell performance
  • Use innovative catalysts (anode and cathode material) and reactor designs to improve fuel cell performance
EPB2023

Related People

Hend Omar Mohamed
Muhammad Arief Shafarifky
Pewee Datoo Kolubah
Rushana Khairova
Sohailh Marie

Related Publications

Balancing Surface Chemistry and Flake Size of MXene-Based Electrodes for Bioelectrochemical Reactors

by Kolubah, Mohamed, Hari, Ping, Hassine, Dally, Obaid, Xu, El-Demellawi, Saikaly, Lanza, Ghaffour, Castaño
Small Year: 2025 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202406223

Abstract

MXenes have excellent properties as electrode materials in energy storage devices or fuel cells. In bioelectrochemical systems (for wastewater treatment and energy harvesting), MXenes can have antimicrobial characteristics in some conditions. Here, different intercalation and delamination approaches to obtain Ti3C2Tx MXene flakes with different terminal groups and lateral dimensions are comprehensively investigated. The effect of these properties on the energy harvesting performance from wastewater is then assessed. Regardless of the utilized intercalant molecules, MXene flakes obtained using soft delamination approaches are much larger (up to 10 µm) than those obtained using mechanical delamination methods (<1.5 nm), with a relatively higher content of ─O/─OH surface terminations. When employed in microbial fuel cells, electrodes made of these large MXene flakes have demonstrated a power density of over 400% higher than smaller MXene flakes, thanks to their lower charge transfer resistance (0.38 Ω). These findings highlight the crucial role of selecting appropriate intercalation and delamination methods when synthesizing MXenes for bioelectrochemical applications.

Keywords

EPB HCE