Laboratory Apparatus to Evaluate Microalgae Production

The application of microalgae for energy purposes and CO2 biomitigation continues to present a number of challenges, including the optimization of culture conditions. The application of experimental designs for microalgae cultivation is difficult, since experiments involving such microorganisms generally last days or weeks. This work proposes a multipurpose laboratory apparatus for the optimization of microalgae experimental conditions that simultaneously enables the evaluation of variables such as temperature, irradiance, photoperiod and CO2 concentration in the aeration stream, as well as variables related to the concentration of culture media nutrients. A case study is also presented in which temperature, concentration of f/2 medium sodium nitrate and the effects of incident light intensity on Nannochloropsis oculata lipid content are evaluated. Experiments were carried out following central composite designs, in batch cultivation within an airlift photobioreactor apparatus. The best experimental result was obtained at 21 °C, 119 mg/L NaNO3 and 137 μE.m.s, corresponding to 41.8% lipids and 211.9 mg.L final lipid concentrations.