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Pretreatment of microalgal biomass for enhanced recovery/extraction of reducing sugars and proteins

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Abstract

Microalgae species including Chlamydomonas mexicana, Micractinium reisseri, Scenedesmus obliquus and Tribonema aequale were cultivated in batch cultures, and their biochemical composition was determined. C. mexicana showed the highest carbohydrate content of 52.6 % and was selected for further study. Sonication pretreatment under optimum conditions (at 40 kHz, 2.2 Kw, 50 °C for 15 min) released 74 ± 2.7 mg g−1 of total reducing sugars (TRS) of dry cell weight, while the combined sonication and enzymatic hydrolysis treatment enhanced the TRS yield by fourfold (280.5 ± 4.9 mg g−1). The optimal ratio of enzyme [E]:substrate [S] for maximum TRS yield was [1]:[5] at 50 °C and pH 5. Combined sonication and hydrolysis treatment released 7.3 % (27.1 ± 0.9 mg g−1) soluble protein of dry cell weight, and further fermentation of the dissolved carbohydrate fraction enhanced the soluble protein content up to 56 % (228.4 mg g−1) of total protein content. Scanning and transmission electron microscopic analyses indicated that microalgae cells were significantly disrupted by the combined sonication and enzyme hydrolysis treatment. This study indicates that pretreatment and subsequent fermentation of the microalgal biomass enhance the recovery of carbohydrates and proteins which can be used as feedstocks for generation of biofuels.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Mid-career Researchers Program (the National Research Foundation of Korea, 2013069183).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Engineering, Hanyang University, Seoul, 133-791, South Korea

    Marwa M. Eldalatony, Hoo Kim & Byong-Hun Jeon

  2. Swette Center for Environmental Biotechnology, The Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University, P.O. Box 875701, Tempe, AZ, 85287-5701, USA

    Jae-Hoon Hwang

  3. Department of Biochemistry, Shivaji University, Vidyanagar, Kolhapur, Maharashtra, 416004, India

    Akhil N. Kabra & Sanjay P. Govindwar

  4. Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Hanyang University, Seoul, 133-791, South Korea

    Ki-Hyun Kim

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  1. Marwa M. Eldalatony
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Correspondence to Byong-Hun Jeon.

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Eldalatony, M.M., Kabra, A.N., Hwang, JH. et al. Pretreatment of microalgal biomass for enhanced recovery/extraction of reducing sugars and proteins. Bioprocess Biosyst Eng 39, 95–103 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00449-015-1493-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00449-015-1493-5

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