text: Increasing agricultural development is associated with the trend of elevated nitrogen concentrations in surrounding soil and groundwater composition due to the runoff of fertilizers and agricultural byproducts. Development of a submerged microbial desalination-denitrification cell (SMDDC) to remove nitrogen and saline from subsurface water alleviates the demand for additional compounds acting as electron donors and instead produces both a net energy and clean, desalinated and denitrified water. In contrast to the typical MDC model, the SMDDC excludes a middle desalination chamber, but instead only contains an anode and cathode chamber separated by a polycarbonate plate and are parallel to the exterior AEM and CEM respectively. Nitrate is introduced through the AEM into the anode chamber through synthetic groundwater, then propagated as an effluent through the external loop to the cathode chamber, in which nitrate is reduced to nitrogen by the cathode and sodium influent. A wastewater feeding tank pumps water to the anodic chamber for subsequent oxidation of sludge by the anodic biofilm. Similar to the original configuration of the MDC, the SMDDC also includes an external circuit in which electrons are thus freed from the oxidation process of the sludge and drove through a closed, external circuit to the cathodic chamber. The toxic and pathogenic content of the wastewater are thus separated simultaneously with the denitrification of the groundwater, producing water that is thus filtered out as a usable effluent. Highest nitrate removal was exhibited when an external voltage (0.8 V) was applied to the circuit, transporting the ions to the anodic chamber and reducing nitrate via heterotrophic denitrification.