No abstract

Botryococcus braunii is a microalga that is regarded as a potential source of renewable fuel because of its ability to produce large amounts of lipid that can be converted into biodiesel. Agro-industrial by-products and wastes are of great interest as cultivation medium for microorganisms because of their low cost, renewable nature, and abundance. In this study, two strategies for low-cost production of B. braunii biomass with high lipid content were performed: (i) the mixotrophic cultivation using molasses, a cheap by-product from the sugar cane plant as a carbon source, and (ii) the photoautotrophic cultivation using nitrate-rich wastewater supplemented with CO2 as a carbon source. The mixotrophic cultivation added with 15 g L(-1) molasses produced a high amount of biomass of 3.05 g L(-1) with a high lipid content of 36.9 %. The photoautotrophic cultivation in nitrate-rich wastewater supplemented with 2.0 % CO2 produced a biomass of 2.26 g L(-1) and a lipid content of 30.3 %. The benefits of this photoautotrophic cultivation are that this cultivation would help to reduce accumulation of atmospheric carbon dioxide and more than 90 % of the nitrate could be removed from the wastewater. When this cultivation was scaled up in a stirred tank photobioreactor and run with semi-continuous cultivation regime, the highest microalgal biomass of 5.16 g L(-1) with a comparable lipid content of 32.2 % was achieved. These two strategies could be promising ways for producing cheap lipid-rich microalgal biomass that can be used as biofuel feedstocks and animal feeds.

Low-cost sago starch was used as a carbon source for production of the exopolysaccharide kefiran by Lactobacillus kefiranofaciens. A simultaneous saccharification and fermentation process of sago starch for kefiran production was evaluated. Factors affecting the process such as an initial pH, temperature, starch concentration, including a mixture of a-amylase and glucoamylase were determined. The highest kefiran concentration of 0.85 g/l was obtained at the initial pH of 5.5, temperature of 30°C, starch concentration of 4% and mixed-enzymes with activity of 100 U/g-starch. The use of a mixture of aamylase and glucoamylase could enhance the productivity compared to the use of a-amylase alone. The optimal ratio of a-amylase to glucoamylase of 60:40 gave the highest kefiran production rate of 11.83 mg/l/h. This study showed that sago starch could serve as a low-cost substrate for kefiran production.