Outline

Table of Contents Innovation Overview 3 Relevance 4 Impact 5 Marketing 6 Economics 7 Future relevance 8 References 9

Fuel cell battery powered by bacteria:

• Two technologies available with membrane (Wang, et al., 2014) and without (Gupta, Bekele, & Ghatak, 2013)

• Compact size for residential device use

• Units can run in series for supplemental powering homes

• Cartridge based cellulose tablets to feed bacteria

Microbial fuel cells, have various advantages, disadvantages, and impacts. There are several different topic areas where microbial fuel cells can make an impact.

• Nutrition

• Environment

• Infectious diseases

• Waste management.

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The future is where Microbial Fuel-Cell technology will have the largest potential for growth. Agriculture, waste management and municipal services could be viewed as the possible early adopters of the application. As this new technology becomes more efficient and the overall cost of implementation decreases, adoption will become more dispersed. Widespread adoption will increase due to the fact that this process consumes organic waste material as a catalyst in the process of generating voltage. Generating power by consuming waste material without toxic emissions will provide an attractive alternative to fossil fuels and expensive solar power, for developing nations and agricultural based economies. The technology has real world applications where power is needed in remote or hard to reach locations. Possible future applications include:

· Powering underwater monitors (weather buoys, Tsunami sensors, scientific monitors, and defense).

· Power to remote sensors or devices (scientific, defense, navigational, security, communication)

· BOD sensing (scientific monitoring for Biological Oxygen Demand)

· Hydrogen Production. (Vishwanathan &Siva Sankra Sai,2009).

When the technology fully matures the possible applications are as endless as the production of organic waste products on our planet. Microbial Fuel-Cell power generation has a huge future as a cost effective and renewable energy source for decades to come.

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References Bretschger, O., Osterstock, J. B., Pinchak, W. E., Ishii, S., & Nelson, K. E. (2009). Microbial Fuel Cells and Microbial Ecology: Applications in Ruminant Health and Production Research. Microbial Ecology, 415-427. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2855437/#CR118 Cummins, F. A. (2009). Building the Agile Enterprise with SOA, BPM and MBM. Burlington, MA: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers. Gupta, R., Bekele, W., & Ghatak, A. (2013). Harvesting interaction between backteria andbacteriophage in a membrane-less fuel cell. Bioresource Technology, 147, 654-657. Martinez, M. (2013, October 2). Bacteria harnesses for battery power. UNWIRE Text, 1. Retrieved from http://db24.linccweb.org/login?url=http://go.galegroup.com.db24.linccweb.org/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA344501257&v=2.1&u=lincclin_spjc&it=r&p=AONE&sw=w&asid=b04e0bb3fa9e6fe97a89351835546b3c Tidd, J., & Bessant, J. (2013). Managing Innovation - Integrating Technological, Market and Organizational Change. West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons. Wang, Z., Hong, Q., Shu, M., Chen, Y., Dong, L., & Ming, Y. (2014). Rumen bacteria convert cellulose into electricity i. Welcome to Journal of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Research, 6(4), 727-732. Retrieved from Journal of Chemical and Pharmaceutical Research: http://jocpr.com/vol6-iss4-2014/JCPR-2014-6-4-727-732.pdf

Vishwanathan, A., & Siva Sankara Sai, S. (2009, December 1). Microbial Fuel Cells - Principles and Applications | AltEnergyMag. Retrieved from http://altenergymag.com/content.php?post_type=1424