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pH treatments in continuous cultivation to maximize microalgal production and nutrient removal from anaerobic digestion effluent of aquatic macrophytes

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Abstract

Green algae have great potential for removing inorganic nutrients from anaerobic digestion effluent (ADE), but there is insufficient available magnesium (Mg) in the ADE from aquatic macrophytes for effective algal growth. In this study, we determined suitable pH and hydraulic retention time (HRT) for maximizing growth of the alga Chlorella sorokiniana and nutrient removal efficiency with a flow-through continuous cultivation system. This used ADE from aquatic macrophytes, adjusted to pH 5.0, 6.0, 6.5 and 7.0 at two HRTs of 6 and 8 days. The highest C. sorokiniana biomass concentration was obtained in the pH 6.5 treatment, being 0.50 and 0.67 g L−1 at 6 and 8 days of HRT, respectively, without Mg enrichment. Both were equivalent to 83.6 mg L−1 day−1 of biomass productivity. Removal rates of both ammonium nitrogen and phosphate phosphorus were almost 100% in pH 6.5 and 7.0 treatments and declined to below 60% in pH 5.0 and 6.0 treatments during the study period. The results demonstrated that a source medium pH of 6.5 using a continuous cultivation system (irrespective of the two HRTs), and increasing available Mg, was suitable for maximizing C. sorokiniana biomass productivity and nutrient removal from the ADE.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Edanz Group (https://en-author-services.edanzgroup.com/) for editing English in a draft of this manuscript.

Code availability

The authors declare that software applications or custom codes support published claims and comply with field standards.

Funding

This study was funded by the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund (Grant Number 4-1406) from the Ministry of the Environment, Japan, to a research project entitled “Novel lake ecosystem management by sustainable harvesting and effective utilization of aquatic weed biomass” and a Research Grant from the Government of Kusatsu City (Shiga, Japan) to S. Ban. The authors gratefully acknowledge financial support from the China Scholarship Council to J. Qian, and an Overseas Research Fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) to S. Akizuki.

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  1. Department of Ecosystem Studies, The University of Shiga Prefecture, Hikone, Shiga, 522-8533, Japan

    Jun Qian, Xin Liu & Syuhei Ban

  2. Faculty of Science and Engineering, Soka University, Hachioji, Tokyo, 192-8577, Japan

    Masaaki Fujiwara, Toshimitsu Kodera, Shinichi Akizuki & Tatsuki Toda

  3. Division of Engineering, University of Guanajuato, Juarez Avenue, Center Zone, 36000, Guanajuato, Mexico

    Shinichi Akizuki

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  1. Jun Qian
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  2. Xin Liu
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Qian, J., Liu, X., Ban, S. et al. pH treatments in continuous cultivation to maximize microalgal production and nutrient removal from anaerobic digestion effluent of aquatic macrophytes. J Appl Phycol 32, 3349–3362 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10811-020-02196-z

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