The Effect of Aeration Rate on the Growth of Scenedesmus quadricauda in Column Photobioreactor

Abstract

The aeration rate is an important factor influencing the growth of microalgae. In this work, different aeration rates: 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1 volume per volume per minute (vvm) were applied to investigate the effect of aeration rate on Scenedesmus quadricauda (S. quadricauda) by using a column photobioreactor. The biomass concentration at early stationary phase and growth rate increased with the increasing of aeration rate, but the aeration rate above 0.6 vvm caused the decline in both growth rate and biomass concentration. The aeration rate did not have the effect on lipid content (around 17%), lipid yield has similar trend with biomass concentration. The optimum aeration rate for lipid yield was 0.6 vvm with 0.553 g L^-1 of biomass concentration, 17.6 % of lipid content and 97.3 mg L^-1 of lipid yield.