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Increasing the cell productivity of mixotrophic growth of Spirulina sp. LEB 18 with crude glycerol

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Abstract

This study investigated the growth of microalgae Spirulina sp. LEB 18 in medium supplemented with crude glycerol to evaluate the biochemical composition of the biomass and its productivity during 72 h of culture. The microalgae cultivated in medium supplemented with 2.5 g L−1 glycerol presented a fourfold higher cell productivity (28.04 mg L−1 h−1) than the control culture, reaching a maximum biomass concentration of 1.08 g L−1 in 36 h. Among the evaluated compounds, proteins were predominant in the biomass throughout the crop, and at the highest concentration of biomass (36 h), the yield was 384.15 mg L−1. The composition of unsaturated fatty acids increased approximately twofold with the organic carbon source (493.53 mg g−1) compared to the control. The predominant fatty acid was oleic acid, reaching 336.00 mg g−1, in the culture supplemented with glycerol. The increase in productivity provides a cost reduction and increases the feasibility of obtaining microalgal biomass products, including biofuels.

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Funding

This study was financed in part by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior-Brasil (CAPES)-Finance Code 001. The authors would also like to thank the Ministry of Science, Technology, Innovations, and Communications, and the Program to Support the Publication of Academic Production/PROPESP/FURG/2018 for providing financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Chemistry and Food Engineering, Laboratory of Biochemical Engineering, Federal University of Rio Grande, Av. Itália, km 8, P.O. Box 474, Rio Grande, RS, 96203-900, Brazil

    Etiele Greque de Morais, Ana Priscila Centeno da Rosa & Jorge Alberto Vieira Costa

  2. Department of Food Science and Technology, Agrarian Science Center, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Admar Gonzaga, P.O. Box 88034-001, Florianópolis, SC, 1346, Brazil

    Itaciara Larroza Nunes

  3. Laboratory of Applied Analysis, Biomaterials and Innovations, Federal University of Bahia, Barão de Geremoabo, s/n, P.O. Box 40170-110, Salvador, BA, Brazil

    Janice Izabel Druzian

  4. College of Chemistry and Food Engineering, Laboratory of Microbiology and Biochemistry, Federal University of Rio Grande, Av. Itália, km 8, P.O. Box 474, Rio Grande, RS, 96203-900, Brazil

    Michele Greque de Morais

Authors
  1. Etiele Greque de Morais
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  2. Itaciara Larroza Nunes
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  3. Janice Izabel Druzian
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  4. Michele Greque de Morais
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  5. Ana Priscila Centeno da Rosa
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  6. Jorge Alberto Vieira Costa
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Contributions

EGM: contributed to all aspects of this work, performed material preparation, data collection and analysis, and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. ILN: gave some valuable comments and suggestions to this work and funding acquisition. JID: funding acquisition and co-supervision. MGM: conceptualization, writing, review, and editing. APCR: writing, review, co-supervision, and editing. JAVC: supervision, editing, and funding acquisition. All authors reviewed the manuscript. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Jorge Alberto Vieira Costa.

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de Morais, E.G., Nunes, I.L., Druzian, J.I. et al. Increasing the cell productivity of mixotrophic growth of Spirulina sp. LEB 18 with crude glycerol. Biomass Conv. Bioref. 14, 7305–7313 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13399-022-02461-w

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