Enhanced lipid and starch productivity of microalga (Chlorococcum sp. TISTR 8583) with nitrogen limitation following effective pretreatments for biofuel production

The study was conducted to evaluate the conditions to enhance the accumulation of lipids and starch in Chlorococcum sp. TISTR 8583 for the production of biofuel. The Chlorococcum sp. TISTR 8583 was cultivated on BG-11 medium under optimized light intensity. The nitrogen limitation (NL) enhanced the accumulation of both starch and lipids and resulted in 34.02% total sugars as compared to 22.57% on nitrogen supplemented (NS) media only. Similarly, the nitrogen supplemented (NS) media produced 17.05% lipids as compared to 29.59% lipids by NL media. The biomass was investigated for biodiesel and bioethanol production by adopting different pretreatment strategies, such as enzyme, acid and alkaline pretreatments. The alkaline pretreatment was found to be efficient strategy (23.67 wt% sugars/g algal biomass: 1.2% (w/v) at 140 ⁰C for 30 min) while the acid pretreatment (1%: v/v; 140 °C) was least effective pretreatment strategy with the yield of 14.83 wt% sugars/g algal biomass. Keywords: Microalgae, Pretreatments, Biofuel, Starch, Lipid