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Green microalgae are attractive to food, pharmaceutical, and biofuel industries due to the promising and diverse properties of their intracellular components. In current biotechnological applications, however, clear bottlenecks are the cell disruption and cell harvesting steps. Challenges in both of these processes are directly linked to the properties of the microalgal cell wall. The aim of this study was to explore the cell wall compositions and morphologies of four Nordic microalgal strains (Chlorella vulgaris (13-1), Scenedesmus sp. (B2-2), Haematococcus pluvialis, and Coelastrella sp. (3-4)) and their changes in relation to logarithmic and stationary growth phases. Transmission electron microscopy imaging enabled us to visualize the cell walls and to observe structural elements such as spines, microfibrillar hairs, or layers. Using cryogenic X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, we quantified lipid, protein, and polysaccharide content of the outer surface of the microalgal cell wall in cultures. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy highlighted changes between growth phases within the polysaccharide and protein fractions of the cell wall. Very prominent differences were observed in sugar and protein composition of the Scenedesmus sp. (B2-2) cell wall compared to the cell walls of the other three Nordic strains using trimethylsilyl derivatization.

Flocculation is often regarded as a cost-effective and reliable method for microalgal harvesting. However, the traditional method often requires the addition of chemical agents to induce flocculation. This carries certain disadvantages including the chemical contamination of the biomass and the subsequent need to remove the flocculants from the medium. To address these issues, this study aimed to induce flocculation in a naturally non-flocculating strain (Chlorella vulgaris 13-1) without resorting to chemical additives, with the ultimate goal of increasing harvesting efficiency. Scanning electron microscopy showed that Scotelliopsis reticulata UFA-2, a naturally flocculating strain, produces extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) whereas 13-1 does not. As a result, two methods were used to induce flocculation in 13-1: co-cultivation of UFA-2 and 13-1, and insertion of EPS produced by UFA-2 into the growth medium of 13-1. The co-cultivation of 13-1 with UFA-2 significantly increased the flocculation efficiency compared to that of 13-1 alone (30 % higher flocculation efficiency after one hour of settling and 52 % higher after three hours of settling). Alternatively, the insertion of dry tightly-bound (TB) UFA-2 EPS into 13-1 cultures also improved flocculation efficiency (by 19 % compared to the control), while addition of soluble or loosely-bound (LB) EPS was less efficient (less than 1 % and 10 %, respectively). FTIR results showed that the composition of TB-EPS was different to that of LB and soluble EPS. TB-EPS contained higher proportions of proteins and different types of carbohydrates, potentially contributing to its increased efficacy in inducing flocculation in microalgae.

Cold stress imposes a great physiological impact on most photosynthetic organisms. The acclimation to cold is very poorly studied in microalgae, even though understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying their cold tolerance has implications for biotechnological applications, such as the development of cold-tolerant strains for industrial purposes. Scenedesmus sp. B2-2 is a Nordic strain of green freshwater microalgae that thrives in cold conditions. Here, we analyzed transcriptomic changes of B2-2 when exposed to the cold (5°C) and compared it to a control grown at 25°C. The aim was to understand more about the mechanisms underlying B2-2's adaptation to low temperatures. We studied differentially expressed genes (DEGs) related to lipid synthesis, carbon metabolism and photosynthesis. Scenedesmus sp. B2-2 produced more lipids when exposed to cold conditions and did not reduce its carbon metabolism or photosynthetic processes. 24 putative cold-responsive genes were found to be non-responsive in Scenedesmus sp. B2-2 when grown at 5°C. These genes could serve as targets for genetic engineering to enhance cold tolerance in algal strains used in biotechnology. We also studied B2-2´s cell wall changes in response to cold by measuring cell wall thickness at 1, 4, 12, 24, 48, 72, 120 and 240 hours of cold exposure and correlating the results to the transcriptomic data. The results show that the cell wall thickens with increased duration of cold exposure. Several glycosyltransferases were found to be significantly up-regulated throughout cold exposure and may play a role in cell wall thickening.

Heavy metals in industrial wastewaters are posing a serious threat to the environment and to human health. Microalgae are increasingly being seen as potential solutions to this problem as they can remove pollutants through biosorption. This process offers certain advantages over other more traditional metal removal techniques as it is simple, inexpensive, eco-friendly, and can be performed over a wide range of experimental conditions. Biosorption is possible due to the unique and complex structure of the microalgal cell wall. The variety of functional groups on the surface of the cell wall (such as carboxyl or amino groups) can act as binding sites for the heavy metals, thus removing them from the environment. This review focuses on the cell wall composition and structure of the most commonly used microalgae in heavy metal removal and shows the role of their cell wall in the biosorption process. This review also aims to report the most commonly used models to predict the velocity of microalgal biosorption and the removal capacities.