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Being constituents of the effluents of many industries, heavy metals cause severe environmental pollution due to their recalcitrance and persistence in the environment. Conventional remediation strategies used to treat heavy metals loaded wastewater are neither economical nor environmentally friendly. To overcome these challenges, the rise of a new process that combines energy conservation and recovery was mandatory. Microbial fuel cells have been recognized as an emerging technology to mitigate environmental pollution; it provides a solution to wastewater treatment and the removal and/or recovery of heavy metals. Microbial fuel cells can be defined as bioelectrochemical systems that utilize the catalytic activity of microorganisms organized in biofilms to oxidize organic or inorganic compounds by producing electric current thus providing a new opportunity for sustainable energy production and bioremediation. The removal of metals, such as chromium, vanadium, arsenic, copper, silver and gold has been studied using both single and double chambered MFCs. The fact that some heavy metals have high redox potential makes it possible to utilize them as effective electron acceptors instead of oxygen in the cathodic chamber of microbial fuel cells. Biotic/Abiotic cathode chambers can not only remove but also recover heavy metals. However, a number of challenges such us: low production rates and limited efficiencies make the application of this technology restricted to lab scale only. In this chapter, we review the treatment of metal-containing effluents using microbial fuel cells. We’ll first summarize the principle of metal removal/recovery in microbial fuel cells, and then provide an overview of literature that attempted to treat metal loaded effluents in both single and double chambered microbial fuel cells while discussing power output, heavy metal removal efficiency and mechanisms involved in the process. Furthermore, the primary challenges and opportunities for scaling-up of microbial fuel cells and their future applications in the treatment of heavy metals contaminated wastewater will be outlined.

Challenges of Microbial Fuel Cell Architecture on Heavy Metal Recovery and Removal From Wastewater