Modelling and simulation of photosynthetic microorganism growth: random walk vs. finite difference method

Abstract

The paper deals with photosynthetic microorganism growth modelling and simulation in a distributed parameter system. Main result concerns the development and comparison of two modelling frameworks for photo-bioreactor modelling. The first "classical" approach is based on PDE (reaction-turbulent diffusion system) and finite difference method. The alternative approach is based on random walk model of transport by turbulent diffusion. The complications residing in modelling of multi-scale transport and reaction phenomena in microalgae are clarified and the solution is chosen. It consists on phenomenological state description of microbial culture by the lumped parameter model of photosynthetic factory (PSF model) in the re-parametrized form, published recently in this journal by Papáček, et al. (2009). Obviously both approaches lead to the same simulation results, nevertheless they provide different advantages.

Growth impact of hydrodynamic dispersion in a Couette–Taylor bioreactor

“…All the values needed to perform further calculations are summarized in Table 1 (u 1 is chosen accordingly to fulfill the condition u av = 1): Similarly as in our work [16], Lagrangian time-dependent simulation (data not shown) revealed that the state vector converges to a steady state in a few minutes (this is the time-scale of the photoinhibition process). Moreover, only the long-term cultivation either in continuous or batch operation mode, where the quasi-steady state is reached, is of biotechnological importance.…”

Photobioreactors for microalgal cultures: A Lagrangian model coupling hydrodynamics and kinetics

“…Models differed for numerical approaches and theories. They include: Eulerian-based partial differential equations, 13,[38][39][40] light dynamic imposition, [41][42][43] direct numeric simulation, 44 flow field imposition, 44 stochastic Lagrangian, [45][46][47][48] and energetic analysis. 49 Luo et al [50][51][52][53] proposed a model integrating kinetics, light distribution, and microalgal particle trajectories observed in an externally irradiated airlift photobioreactor by means of computer automated radioactive particle tracking (CARPT).…”

Intelligent Individual Agent-based Simulation of Photobioreactors and Growth Control

“…Simulated photobioreactors are useful for shedding light on the cultivation process of phytoplankton [10,32]. Algae in particular, such as H. pluvialis are cultivated en masse for valuable by-products; for example, carotenoids like Astaxanthin [35].…”

“…To date, most simulation work towards simulating photobioreactors has involved 1-dimensional models [10,32], to observe the effects of illumination variance. This emphasises exactly how important light availability is to cultivation efforts.…”