Obtaining microalgae biomass in a small scale reactor

Abstract

In order to industrialize massive production of microalgae with biotechnologically important traits, it is essential to reduce production costs through the design and evaluation of different culture media, which are reflected in the value of the final product. It is important to know and understand the dynamics of growth and behavior of the strain of interest, as well as the response to different environmental factors, in order to obtain an adequate and permanent production of biomass. Tetraselmis sp. is an ellipsoidal mobile, compressed alga with four flagella and the acute rear end with the anterior end of four lobes. It is green bright, 7 µm in diameter and 10-16 µm in length. It is a euryhaline species with ability to form spores, whose limits of tolerance to physical variables are very broad. It contains 49.22% protein, 10.60% lipid and 16.38% from carbohydrates. The microalgae Tetraselmis sp. was massively cultivated with Guillard media, and their biomass was harvested every 72 h, we obtained an biomass average of 1.35 g/L/d.