Algal diversity and traits predict biomass yield and grazing resistance in wastewater cultivation

Thomas, Patrick K.; Dunn, Gary P.; Coats, Erik R.; Newby, Deborah T.; Feris, Kevin P.

doi:10.1007/s10811-019-01764-2

Cited by 20 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…Although polycultures provide substantial benefits for algal cultivation (Godwin et al, 2018;Narwani et al, 2016;Newby et al, 2016;Thomas et al, 2019), they rarely outperform their constituent monocultures with respect to biomass yields (Schmidtke et al, 2010;Shurin et al, 2014). Allelopathy is one plausible mechanism for such underyielding; however, this has not been explicitly measured in any biodiversity-productivity studies to our knowledge.…”

Section: Ankistrodesmusmentioning

confidence: 97%

Tolerance to allelopathic inhibition by free fatty acids in five biofuel candidate microalgae strains

Thomas

Hietala

2023

Bioresource Technology Reports

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Section: Ankistrodesmusmentioning

confidence: 97%

Tolerance to allelopathic inhibition by free fatty acids in five biofuel candidate microalgae strains

Thomas

Hietala

2023

Bioresource Technology Reports

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“…Polycultures may be less prone to trade-offs between desirable functions (like grazing resistance and growth rate). [77] Natural algal polyculture HRAP with different depths of 20, 30, and 40 cm.…”

Section: Culturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Effluent quality of HRAP system compared with conventional wastewater treatment ponds in New Zealand (Integrated Tables 1 and 2 in Craggs et al [18]). The polyculture of native algal communities has been used for algae biomass production and wastewater treatment in open ponds and bioreactors (Table 3) [14,[16][17][18][19][26][27][28][76][77][78][79][80][81][82][83]. However, there is little information on the compositional dynamics of the native algal community in polyculture.…”

Section: Polyculture Of Microalgae Isolatedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Biocrude Oil Production by Integrating Microalgae Polyculture and Wastewater Treatment: Novel Proposal on the Use of Deep Water-Depth Polyculture of Mixotrophic Microalgae

Watanabe

Isdepsky

2021

Energies

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Microalgae have attracted significant attention worldwide as one of the most promising feedstock fossil fuel alternatives. However, there are a few challenges for algal fuels to compete with fossil fuels that need to be addressed. Therefore, this study reviews the R&D status of microalgae-based polyculture and biocrude oil production, along with wastewater treatment. Mixotrophic algae are free to some extent from light restrictions using organic matter and have the ability to grow well even in deep water-depth cultivation. It is proposed that integrating the mixotrophic microalgae polyculture and wastewater treatment process is the most promising and harmonizing means to simultaneously increase capacities of microalgae biomass production and wastewater treatment with a low land footprint and high robustness to perturbations. A large amount of mixotrophic algae biomass is harvested, concentrated, and dewatered by combining highly efficient sedimentation through flocculation and energy efficient filtration, which reduce the carbon footprint for algae fuel production and coincide with the subsequent hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) conversion. HTL products are obtained with a relatively low carbon footprint and separated into biocrude oil, solid, aqueous, and gas fractions. Algae biomass feedstock-based HTL conversion has a high biocrude oil yield and quality available for existing oil refineries; it also has a bioavailability of the recycled nitrogen and phosphorus from the aqueous phase of algae community HTL. The HTL biocrude oil represents higher sustainability than conventional liquid fuels and other biofuels for the combination of greenhouse gas (GHG) and energy return on investment (EROI). Deep water-depth polyculture of mixotrophic microalgae using sewage has a high potential to produce sustainable biocrude oil within the land area of existing sewage treatment plants in Japan to fulfill imported crude oil.

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“…One approach with the potential to stabilize annual productivity is to use designed polycultures, such that different algae species or strains with complementary traits can overcome trade-offs faced by monocultures [9][10][11][12], thus simultaneously maintaining baseline productivity and preventing pond crash. This can take a variety of forms, including, e.g., using chemically-defended strains [13] or large-3 celled/colonial strains [14] to act as an "associational refuge" capable of protecting undefended but fastergrowing strains [9].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Botryococcus brauniireduces algal grazing losses toDaphniaandPoterioochromonasthrough both chemical and physical interference

Thomas,

Arn,

Freiermuth

et al. 2024

Preprint

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Crop protection from algal grazers is a key area of concern, as grazing zooplankton and flagellates can decimate algal crops and impede economic viability of cultivation for biofuels and bioproducts. Inhibition of grazing by chemical and physical interference is one promising solution; however, there have been few empirical tests of this approach that use defense traits innate to algal crop species. Here we conduct an experiment to test whether the hydrocarbon excreting algaBotryococcus brauniican mitigate losses to grazing by two distinct grazers,Daphnia magnaandPoterioochromonas malhamensis, due to both chemical inhibition and physical interference linked to large/inedible colonies. We show that chemical and physical defenses interactively reduce the total effect of grazing, thus significantly increasing the biomass of cultures ofB. brauniiandNannochloropsis limneticawhen either grazer is present. Specifically,B. brauniifiltrate alone inhibits grazing and thus weakens top-down control ofN. limneticagrowth rates and final biomass by both grazers;B. brauniicolonies alone also inhibit biomass losses; and the combination of filtrate andB. brauniicolonies reveals an interactive effect of both chemical and physical defenses on grazing. Our study demonstrates how community engineering can identify synergies arising from algal cocultivation (e.g., by using industrially relevant strains for crop protection). Such ecological discoveries may help to reduce the costs of large-scale deployment of algal cultivation for sustainable foods, fuels, bioproducts (e.g., bioplastics), and carbon capture.

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Algal diversity and traits predict biomass yield and grazing resistance in wastewater cultivation

Cited by 20 publications

References 42 publications

Tolerance to allelopathic inhibition by free fatty acids in five biofuel candidate microalgae strains

Tolerance to allelopathic inhibition by free fatty acids in five biofuel candidate microalgae strains

Biocrude Oil Production by Integrating Microalgae Polyculture and Wastewater Treatment: Novel Proposal on the Use of Deep Water-Depth Polyculture of Mixotrophic Microalgae

Botryococcus brauniireduces algal grazing losses toDaphniaandPoterioochromonasthrough both chemical and physical interference

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