Growth yield determination in a chemostat culture of the marine microalgaIsochrysis galbana

Abstract

The growth yield of the PUFA-producing marine microalgaIsochrysis galbana ALII-4 grown in a light limited chemostat, was measured under a wide variety of conditions of incident irradiance (I O ) and dilution rates (D). The experiments were conducted under laboratory conditions at 20 °C under continuous light. D ranged from 0.0024 to 0.0410 h−1 at three intensities of Io (820, 1620 and 3270 µmol photon m−2 s−1) close to those found in outdoor cultures. A maximum efficiency Ψ max = 0.616 g mol photon−1 was obtained at I O = 820 µmol photon m−2 s−1 and D = 0.030 h−1 and the maximum capacity of the biomass to metabolize the light harvested was found to be 13.1 µmol photon g−1 s−1. Above this value, a significant drop in the system efficiency was observed. A new approach based in the averaged irradiance is used to assess the photon flux absorbed by the biomass.