Magnetohydrodynamic Enhancement of Biofuel Cell Performance

Biofuel cells have become an interesting alternative for the design of sustainable energy conversion systems with multiple applications ranging from biosensing and bioelectronics to autonomously moving devices. However, as an electrochemical system, their performance is intimately related to mass transport conditions. In this work, the magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) effect is studied as an easy and straightforward alternative to enhance the performance of a biofuel cell based on the enzymes glucose oxidase (GOx) and bilirubin oxidase (BOD). The synergetic effect between the electric and ionic currents, produced by the enzymatic redox reactions, and a magnetic field orthogonal to the surface of the electrodes, leads to the formation of localized magnetohydrodynamic vortexes. Such an integrated convective regime generates an increase of the bioelectrocatalytic current and its concomitant power output in the presence of the external magnetic field. In addition, by fine-tuning the spatial arrangement of the anode and cathode, it is possible to benefit from the sum of anodic and cathodic MHD vortexes, leading to an enhanced power output of up to 300 %.