Inducing laccase activity in white rot fungi using copper ions and improving the efficiency of azo dye treatment with electricity generation using microbial fuel cells.

This work presents a white rot fungus-microbial fuel cell (WRF-MFC) that uses WRF that is grown at its cathode. Adding Cu to the fungi-containing solid medium stimulated WRF-secreting laccase, which catalyzed the redox reaction in the MFC and thereby promoting the generation of electricity. Adding 12.5 mg L Cu to a G. lucidum-containing medium provided the greatest laccase stimulation and increased the laccase activity by a factor of 1.6. Adding 12.5 mg L Cu to the WRF chamber of WRF-MFC increased its decolorization of Acid Orange 7 (AO-7) and increased its power density to 223 mW m, which was 1.77 times that of an MFC without WRF. The enhancement of decolorization and electricity generation improved the performance of the WRF-MFC, indicating that a laccase-catalyzed cathode has great potential effectiveness in microbial fuel cells.