Microbes, electronic devices

Another possible cause of materials degradation in indoor environments is microbes. The authors and colleagues have seen only a few instances in the past 25 years where microbes were found to be responsible for failures in electronic equipment and devices. Curiously, there have also been a few instances in which failures have been attributed to insects, including black widow spiders infesting remote equipment huts and rodents depositing corrosive substances, e.g. urine, on circuit boards. Design engi-... 

In 2005, two research groups independendy found that bacteria could produce hydrogen in an electrolysis process based on a microbial fuel cell (MFC) (Logan et al., 2008). The device is called a microbial electrolysis cell (MEC), and the microbes are exoelectrogens because they release electrons instead of hydrogen. The half reactions at anode and cathode of MFCs for conversion of hydrogen from acetate are ... 

---