Dear Colleagues,

Extracellular electron transfer (EET) is a metabolic capability displayed by numerous microorganisms that enables them to colonize and grow in diverse environments where soluble electron acceptors and donors are limited. Using EET, these microorganisms can exchange electrons with extracellular solid compounds, including metal minerals (e.g. iron and manganese oxides) in their natural environment, or conductive materials, such as electrodes, in artificial bioelectrochemical systems. In the last two decades, this microbial activity has received considerable attention for several biotechnological applications, including bioremediation of environmental sites contaminated with toxic metals, production of electricity, bioelectrosynthesis of industrially valuable commodities and wastewater treatment. Understanding the mechanisms of EET is crucial, not only to understand the impact of these organisms in the global biogeochemical cycles of metals, in particular of iron, but also to apply them in sustainable biotechnological processes.

The scope of this special issue is to cover the fundamental aspects of EET processes, in particular the molecular mechanisms by which microorganisms exchange electrons with extracellular solid compounds. Reviews and Original Research articles are welcome. Emphasis will be made on manuscripts that focus on microorganisms that perform EET, molecular aspects of their EET pathways, and on the fundamental knowledge of the microbial EET metabolism.

Dr. Catarina M. Paquete and Dr. Ricardo O. Louro

Guest Editors