| Abstract | Water resources globally are experiencing increasing stress, with approximately four billion people facing water scarcity. Desalination is being expanded to supplement freshwater supplies; however, current technologies, such as reverse osmosis, are constrained by high energy demand. Microbial Desalination Cells (MDCs) offer a promising, sustainable alternative that simultaneously achieves desalination, wastewater treatment, and bioenergy production. However, scalability has been hindered by low desalination efficiency. We developed a novel microalgae-integrated MDC utilising salt-tolerant microalgae and 3D-bioprinted graphene-enhanced electrodes to enhance ion removal. The MDC utilising Chlorella vulgaris achieved the highest desalination rate of 1.75 mS/cm/h, with an efficiency of 95.7%, demonstrating significant potential for MDC optimisation. |
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