Stephen Andersen

Electro-Fermentation – Merging Electrochemistry with Fermentation in Industrial Applications

Electro-fermentation (EF) merges traditional industrial fermentation with electrochemistry. An imposed electrical field influences the fermentation environment and microbial metabolism in either a reductive or oxidative manner. The benefit of this approach is to produce target biochemicals with improved selectivity, increase carbon efficiency, limit the use of additives for redox balance or pH control, enhance microbial growth, or in some cases enhance product recovery. We discuss the principles of electrically driven fermentations and how EF can be used to steer both pure culture and microbiota-based fermentations. An overview is given on which advantages EF may bring to both existing and innovative industrial fermentation processes, and which doors might be opened in waste biomass utilization towards added-value biorefineries.

Electrolytic membrane extraction enables production of fine chemicals from biorefinery sidestreams

Short-chain carboxylates such as acetate are easily produced through mixed culture fermentation of many biological waste streams, although routinely digested to biogas and combusted rather than harvested. We developed a pipeline to extract and upgrade short-chain carboxylates to esters via membrane electrolysis and biphasic esterification. Carboxylate-rich broths are electrolyzed in a cathodic chamber from which anions flux across an anion exchange membrane into an anodic chamber, resulting in a clean acid concentrate with neither solids nor biomass. Next, the aqueous carboxylic acid concentrate reacts with added alcohol in a water-excluding phase to generate volatile esters. In a batch extraction, 96 ± 1.6% of the total acetate was extracted in 48 h from biorefinery thin stillage (5 g L(-1) acetate) at 379 g m(-2) d(-1) (36% Coulombic efficiency). With continuously regenerated thin stillage, the anolyte was concentrated to 14 g/L acetic acid, and converted at 2.64 g (acetate) L(-1) h(-1) in the first hour to ethyl acetate by the addition of excess ethanol and heating to 70 °C, with a final total conversion of 58 ± 3%. This processing pipeline enables direct production of fine chemicals following undefined mixed culture fermentation, embedding carbon in industrial chemicals rather than returning them to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide.

Dynamically adaptive control system for bioanodes in serially stacked bioelectrochemical systems.

Microbial bioelectrochemical systems (BESs) use microorganisms as catalysts for electrode reactions. They have emerging applications in bioenergy, bioproduction, and bioremediation. BESs can be scaled up as a linked series of units or cells; however, this may lead to so-called cell reversal. Here, we demonstrate a cell balance system (CBS) that controls individual BES cells connected electrically in series by dynamically adapting the applied potential in the kilohertz frequency range relative to the performance of the bioanode. The CBS maintains the cell voltage of individual BES cells at or below a maximum set point by bypassing a portion of applied current with a high-frequency metal oxide semiconductor field-effect transistor switch control system. We demonstrate (i) multiple serially connected BES cells started simultaneously and rapidly from a single power source, as the CBS imparts no current limitation, (ii) continuous, stable, and independent performance of each stacked BES cell, and (iii) stable BES cell and stack performance under excessive applied currents. This control system has applications for not only serially stacked BESs in scaled-up stacks but also rapidly starting individual- and/or lab-scale BESs.

Extraction and Esterification of Low‐Titer Short‐Chain Volatile Fatty Acids from Anaerobic Fermentation with Ionic Liquids

Ionic liquids can both act as a solvent and mediate esterification to valorize low-titer volatile fatty acids and generate organic solvents from renewable carbon sources including biowaste and CO2 . In this study, four phosphonium ionic liquids were tested for single-stage extraction of acetic acid from a dilute stream and esterification to ethyl acetate with added ethanol and heat. The esterification proceeded with a maximum conversion of 85.9±1.3 % after 30 min at 75 °C at a 1:1 stoichiometric ratio of reactants. Extraction and esterification can be tailored using mixed-anion ionic liquids; this is demonstrated herein using a common trihexyl(tetradecyl)phosphonium cation and a mixed chloride and bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide anion ionic liquid. As a further proof-of-concept, ethyl acetate was generated from an ionic liquid-driven esterification of an acetic acid extractant generated using CO2 as the only carbon source by microbial electrosynthesis.

Electrochemically and bioelectrochemically induced ammonium recovery.

Streams such as urine and manure can contain high levels of ammonium, which could be recovered for reuse in agriculture or chemistry. The extraction of ammonium from an ammonium-rich stream is demonstrated using an electrochemical and a bioelectrochemical system. Both systems are controlled by a potentiostat to either fix the current (for the electrochemical cell) or fix the potential of the working electrode (for the bioelectrochemical cell). In the bioelectrochemical cell, electroactive bacteria catalyze the anodic reaction, whereas in the electrochemical cell the potentiostat applies a higher voltage to produce a current. The current and consequent restoration of the charge balance across the cell allow the transport of cations, such as ammonium, across a cation exchange membrane from the anolyte to the catholyte. The high pH of the catholyte leads to formation of ammonia, which can be stripped from the medium and captured in an acid solution, thus enabling the recovery of a valuable nutrient. The flux of ammonium across the membrane is characterized at different anolyte ammonium concentrations and currents for both the abiotic and biotic reactor systems. Both systems are compared based on current and removal efficiencies for ammonium, as well as the energy input required to drive ammonium transfer across the cation exchange membrane. Finally, a comparative analysis considering key aspects such as reliability, electrode cost, and rate is made. This video article and protocol provide the necessary information to conduct electrochemical and bioelectrochemical ammonia recovery experiments. The reactor setup for the two cases is explained, as well as the reactor operation. We elaborate on data analysis for both reactor types and on the advantages and disadvantages of bioelectrochemical and electrochemical systems.

A Clostridium Group IV Species Dominates and Suppresses a Mixed Culture Fermentation by Tolerance to Medium Chain Fatty Acids Products

A microbial community is engaged in a complex economy of cooperation and competition for carbon and energy. In engineered systems such as anaerobic digestion and fermentation, these relationships are exploited for conversion of a broad range of substrates into products, such as biogas, ethanol, and carboxylic acids. Medium chain fatty acids (MCFAs), for example, hexanoic acid, are valuable, energy dense microbial fermentation products, however, MCFA tend to exhibit microbial toxicity to a broad range of microorganisms at low concentrations. Here, we operated continuous mixed population MCFA fermentations on biorefinery thin stillage to investigate the community response associated with the production and toxicity of MCFA. In this study, an uncultured species from the Clostridium group IV (related to Clostridium sp. BS-1) became enriched in two independent reactors that produced hexanoic acid (up to 8.1 g L−1), octanoic acid (up to 3.2 g L−1), and trace concentrations of decanoic acid. Decanoic acid is reported here for the first time as a possible product of a Clostridium group IV species. Other significant species in the community, Lactobacillus spp. and Acetobacterium sp., generate intermediates in MCFA production, and their collapse in relative abundance resulted in an overall production decrease. A strong correlation was present between the community composition and both the hexanoic acid concentration (p = 0.026) and total volatile fatty acid concentration (p = 0.003). MCFA suppressed species related to Clostridium sp. CPB-6 and Lactobacillus spp. to a greater extent than others. The proportion of the species related to Clostridium sp. BS-1 over Clostridium sp. CPB-6 had a strong correlation with the concentration of octanoic acid (p = 0.003). The dominance of this species and the increase in MCFA resulted in an overall toxic effect on the mixed community, most significantly on the Lactobacillus spp., which resulted in a decrease in total hexanoic acid concentration to 32 ± 2% below the steady-state average. As opposed to the current view of MCFA toxicity broadly leading to production collapse, this study demonstrates that varied tolerance to MCFA within the community can lead to the dominance of some species and the suppression of others, which can result in a decreased productivity of the fermentation.

A novel high-throughput method for kinetic characterisation of anaerobic bioproduction strains, applied to Clostridium kluyveri

Hexanoic acid (HA), also called caproic acid, can be used as an antimicrobial agent and as a precursor to various chemicals, such as fuels, solvents and fragrances. HA can be produced from ethanol and acetate by the mesophilic anaerobic bacterium Clostridium kluyveri, via two successive elongation steps over butyrate. A high-throughput anaerobic growth curve technique was coupled to a data analysis framework to assess growth kinetics for a range of substrate and product concentrations. Using this method, growth rates and several kinetic parameters were determined for C. kluyveri. A maximum growth rate (µmax) of 0.24 ± 0.01 h−1 was found, with a half-saturation index for acetic acid (KS,AA) of 3.8 ± 0.9 mM. Inhibition by butyric acid occurred at of 124.7 ± 5.7 mM (KI,BA), while the final product, HA, linearly inhibited growth with complete inhibition above 91.3 ± 10.8 mM (KHA of 10.9*10−3 ± 1.3*10−3 mM−1) at pH = 7, indicating that the hexanoate anion also exerts toxicity. These parameters were used to create a dynamic mass-balance model for bioproduction of HA. By coupling data collection and analysis to this modelling framework, we have produced a powerful tool to assess the kinetics of anaerobic micro-organisms, demonstrated here with C. kluyveri, in order further explore the potential of micro-organisms for chemicals production.