Publications

Development and testing of an air breathing, membrane separated, enzyme anode fuel cell for glucose fuels

Apblett, Christopher A.; Ingersoll, David I.; Roberts, Greg

In light of difficulties in realizing a carbohydrate fuel cell that can run on animal or plant carbohydrates, a study was carried out to fabricate a membrane separated, platinum cathode, enzyme anode fuel cell, and test it under both quiescent and flow through conditions. Mediator loss to the flowing solution was the largest contributor to power loss. Use of the phenazine derivative mediators offered decent open circuit potentials for half cell and full cell performance, but suffered from quick loss to the solution which hampered long term operation. A means to stabilize the phenazine molecules to the electrode would need to be developed to extend the lifetime of the cell beyond its current level of a few hours. This is an abstract of a paper presented ACS Fuel Chemistry Meeting (Washington, DC Fall 2005).