Ceramic Soil Microbial Fuel Cells Sensors for Early Detection of Eutrophication

The increasing use of fertilisers rises the risk of eutrophication, a sudden algal bloom that seriously damage ecosystems due to critical oxygen depletion. Continuous monitoring of oxygen in environmental waters could improve the detection of eutrophication and prevent anoxic conditions. However, online and in situ dissolved oxygen sensors are yet to be implemented due to poor portability and power requirements. Here, we propose a ceramic soil microbial fuel cell as a selfpowered sensor for algal growth detection via monitoring of dissolved oxygen in water. The sensor signal follows the characteristic photosynthetic cycle, with a maximum day current of 0.18 ± 0.2 mA and a minimum night current of 0.06 ± 0.34 mA, which correlates with dissolved oxygen (R2 = 0.85 (day); R2 = 0.5 (night)) and algal concentration (R2 = 0.63). A saturated design of experiments on seven factors suggests that temperature, dissolved oxygen, nitrates, and pH are the most influential operational factors in the voltage output. Moreover, operating the system at maximum power point (Rext = 2 kΩ) improves the sensor sensitivity. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first proposed MFC-based biosensor for in-field, early detection of eutrophic events.