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Enhancing CO2 utilization by a physical absorption-based technique in microalgae culture

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Abstract

Carbon dioxide supplementation is significant for cell growth in autotrophic cultures of microalgae. However, the CO2 utilization efficiency is quite low in most processes. Aimed at this problem, six kinds of physical absorption enhancers were investigated to enhance the biological carbon sequestration of microalgae. By the addition of a small amount of CO2 absorption enhancer, the total inorganic carbon concentration of the medium was significantly increased. In addition, the biomass productivity of Scenedesmus dimorphus was maximally increased by 63% by the addition of propylene carbonate in flask cultures. In cultures using an air-lift photobioreactor equipped with a pH-feedback control system to supply CO2, the CO2 consumption was maximally reduced by 71% with added polyethylene glycol dimethyl ether. This study indicates that the incorporation of physical absorption enhancers could be a promising approach to overcome the problems of low CO2 utilization efficiency and high carbon source cost in algal biomass production.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 31802323) and High-level Talent Support Program of Yangzhou University.

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Author notes

  1. Zhong-Liang Sun and Meng-Ru Xin contributed equally to this work and should be considered co-first authors.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Life Sciences, Yantai University, Yantai, 264005, People’s Republic of China

    Zhong-Liang Sun, Meng-Ru Xin, Ping Li & Li-Qin Sun

  2. Joint International Research Laboratory of Agriculture & Agri-Product Safety, Yangzhou University, Yangzhou, 225009, People’s Republic of China

    Shi-Kai Wang

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Contributions

ZS: Investigation, Methodology, Writing—original draft. MX: Methodology, Validation, Writing—review. PL: Resources, Writing—review. LS: Writing—review. SW: Conceptualization, Supervision, Writing—review and editing.

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Correspondence to Shi-Kai Wang.

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Sun, ZL., Xin, MR., Li, P. et al. Enhancing CO2 utilization by a physical absorption-based technique in microalgae culture. Bioprocess Biosyst Eng 44, 1901–1912 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00449-021-02570-2

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