4.8 Article

Fermentation of Glycerol into Ethanol in a Microbial Electrolysis Cell Driven by a Customized Consortium

Journal

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Volume 48, Issue 11, Pages 6350-6358

Publisher

AMER CHEMICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1021/es500690a

Keywords

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Funding

  1. NSF [MCB-1021948]
  2. Michigan State University Foundation
  3. Michigan State's AgBioResearch
  4. Michigan State's College of Natural Sciences
  5. Direct For Biological Sciences
  6. Div Of Molecular and Cellular Bioscience [1021948] Funding Source: National Science Foundation

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The in situ generation of ethanol from glycerol-containing wastewater shows promise to improve the economics of the biodiesel industry. Consequently, we developed a microbial electrolysis cell (MEC) driven by the synergistic metabolisms of the exoelectrogen Geobacter sulfurreducens and the bacterium Clostridium cellobioparum, which fermented glycerol into ethanol in high yields (90%) and produced fermentative byproducts that served as electron donors for G. sulfurreducens. Syntrophic cooperation stimulated glycerol consumption, ethanol production, and the conversion of fermentation byproducts into cathodic H-2 in the MEC. The platform was further improved by adaptively evolving glycerol-tolerant strains with robust growth at glycerol loadings typical of biodiesel wastewater and by increasing the buffering capacity of the anode medium. This resulted in additional increases in glycerol consumption (up to 50 g/L) and ethanol production (up to 10 g/L) at rates that greatly exceeded the capacity of the anode biofilms to concomitantly remove the fermentation byproducts. As a result, 1,3-propanediol was generated as a metabolic sink for electrons not converted into electricity syntrophically. The results highlight the potential of consortia to process glycerol in MECs and provide insights into genetic engineering and system design approaches that can be implemented to further improve MEC performance to satisfy industrial needs.

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