Biomass and lipid accumulation of three new screened microalgae with high concentration of carbon dioxide and nitric oxide

Abstract

Three species of indigenous microalgae species were isolated from an artificial lake. They were identified as Scenedesmus sp., through the molecular phylogenetic and morphological method and named SDEC-12, SDEC-13 and SDEC-14. To evaluate their tolerance to the harmful composition in the exhaust gas and the potential to produce biodiesel, they were cultured with 15% CO₂ and 200 ppm NO. The SDEC-13 and SDEC-14 strains were able to grow well under 15% CO₂ with the maximum biomass productivity of 0.087 and 0.090 g L⁻¹ d⁻¹, respectively. When cultured with 15% CO₂, the three strains showed a similar total lipid content (25.7–28.25%) and the fatty acid of SDEC-14 strain showed the highest saturated level (76.59%). SDEC-13 was the only strain that could tolerate 200 ppm NO and 15% CO₂, while its total lipid content remained unaffected by the NO, so the SDEC-13 strain had the potential to produce biodiesel with flue gas.

Keywords:

• microalgae
• identification
• carbon dioxide
• nitric oxide
• biodiesel

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Findlay A Nicol of Shandong University of Finance and Economics for revising the English language in the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this research was provided by Natural Science Foundation of China [51078221], Science and Technology Development Planning of Shandong Province [2012GGE27027], The Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University of the Ministry of Education of China [Grant No. NCET-12–0341].