Abstract
Microbial fuel cell (MFC) is an emerging technology for sustainable energy production. An MFC employs indigenous microorganisms as biocatalysts and can theoretically convert any biodegradable substrate into electricity, making the technology a viable solution for sustainable waste treatment or autonomous power supply. However, the electric energy currently generated from MFCs is not directly usable due to the low voltage and current output. Moreover, the output power can fluctuate significantly according to the operating points, which makes stable harvest of energy difficult. This paper presents an MFC energy harvesting scheme using two layers of DC/DC converters. The proposed energy harvester can capture the energy from multiple MFCs at the most efficient operating point and at the same time form the energy into a usable shape.
Bio
Dr. Jae-Do Park receives his Ph.D. degree from the Pennsylvania State University, University Park, in 2007. Dr. Park is currently an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Colorado Denver. His research interests are in the energy system applications such as renewable energy sources, energy harvesting systems, flywheel energy storage systems, grid-interactive distributed generation systems, and microgrid systems. Prior to his arrival at the University of Colorado Denver, Dr. Park worked for Pentadyne Power Corporation in California as the Manager of Software and Controls, where he took charge of control algorithm design and software development for the high-speed flywheel energy storage system. He also worked at the R&D Center of LG Industrial Systems in Korea, where he developed induction machine drive systems such as high-speed elevator drives and general purpose inverters as a research engineer.
