Patent ID: 7736789

Claim:
A fuel cell having a plurality of multilayered unit cells, wherein the unit cells are arranged in a stack and each of the unit cells comprising: a fuel chamber to which a liquid fuel is supplied; a fuel electrode adjacent the fuel chamber and to which the liquid fuel is supplied from the fuel chamber and by which cation and electrons are generated from the liquid fuel; an electrolyte membrane adjacent the fuel electrode and through which cations derived from the fuel electrode permeate; an oxidizer chamber to which an oxidizer is supplied and which is separate from the fuel chamber of the unit cell; and an oxidizer electrode which is adjacent to the oxidizer chamber and to which the oxidizer is supplied from the oxidizer chamber and which is placed so as to face the electrolyte membrane and which yields a reaction between the oxidizer and the cations permeated through the electrolyte membrane, wherein gas generated from the fuel electrode in a first unit cell among unit cells is discharged into the fuel chamber of the first unit cell; gas generated from the oxidizer electrode of the first unit cell is discharged into the oxidizer chamber for the first unit cell; gas generated from the fuel electrode in a second unit cell among the multilayered unit cells is discharged into the fuel chamber of the second unit cell, wherein the second unit cell is adjacent to the first unit cell in the stack, and the fuel chamber of the first unit cell adjoins the oxidizer chamber of the third unit cell: gas generated from the oxidizer electrode of the second unit cell is discharged into the oxidizer chamber of the second unit cell; the gas in the oxidizer chamber of the first unit cell and the gas in the fuel chamber of the second unit cell are merged with each other to be discharged from the multilayered unit cells, wherein a preliminary exhaust chamber between the fuel chamber of the first unit cell and the oxidizer chamber of the third unit cell leads the gas discharged from the fuel chamber of the first unit cell and the gas discharged from the oxidizer chamber of the third unit cell to a gas discharge port, and the gas in the fuel chamber of the first unit cell is merged with gas in the oxidizer chamber of a third unit cell adjacent to the first unit cell in the stack.