Biofuel, a form of renewable fuel, has promising future, especially as the alternative fuel for transportation. Biofuel is usually blended with petroleum fuel and used in flex fuel engines. Since the characteristics of biofuel are quite different from those of the petroleum based fuel, it is very important to optimize the combustion properties for biofuel engines under different fuel blends. Th...

A key strategy for biofuel production is making use of the chemical energy stored in plant cell walls. Cell walls are a strong meshwork of sugar chains and other polymers that encircle each plant cell. Collectively known as lignocellulose, cell wall material represents the bulk of plant dry mass. Biofuels can be made by releasing sugars from lignocellulose and converting them into fuel; however...

Biofuel cells have received significant attention in the last few decades due to its potential application as alternative energy sources and advantages over conventional fuel cells. This review summarizes different types of glucose biofuel cells with emphasis on enzymatic glucose biofuel cells. Unlike conventional fuel cells, which use fuel such as ethanol, methanol, formic acid, etc. to genera...

Highly efficient supported catalyst layers based on metallic/bimetallic (Pt, Au-Pt) nanoparticles decorated-single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNT) on Buckypaper (BP) for direct glucose fuel cell are presented here. The electrodes have been tested in mixed-reactant biofuel cell. High glucose-tolerance, stability and catalytic activity are observed for the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) that resu...

Biofuel cells have been widely used to generate bioelectricity. Early biofuel cells employ a semi-permeable membrane to separate the anodic and cathodic compartments. The impact of different membrane materials and compositions has also been explored. Some membrane materials are employed strictly as membrane separators, while some have gained significant attention in the immobilization of enzyme...

This paper discusses the fundamentals and developments of miniaturized fuel cells, both biological and electrochemical. An overview of microfluidic fuel cells, miniaturized microbial fuel cells, enzymatic biofuel cells, and implanted biofuel cells in an attempt to provide green energy and to power implanted microdevices is provided. Also, the challenges and applications of each type of fuel cel...

In the last few decades, finding alternatives to fossil fuels has become a hot issue across all international frontiers. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has shed light on the feasibility of using biofuels to meet the growing energy demand as well as to reduce CO2 emissions which are a major cause of global warming, especially in the transportation sector. The...

The requirement for a miniature, high density, long life, and rechargeable power source is common to a vast majority of microsystems, including the implantable devices for medical applications. A model biofuel cell system operating in human serum has been studied for future applications of biomedical and implantable medical devices. Anodic and cathodic electrodes were made of carbon nanotube-bu...

BACKGROUND In light of the rapid decrease in fossils fuel reserves and an increasing demand for energy, novel methods are required to explore alternative biofuel production processes to alleviate these pressures. A wide variety of molecules which can either be used as biofuels or as biofuel precursors are produced using microbial enzymes. However, the common challenges in the industrial impleme...