OPTIMIZING THE CRITICAL ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS INFLUENCING THE GROWTH AND LIPID PRODUCTION OF MICROALGAE
Y. Neeraja* and Prof. Ammani K.
ABSTRACT
Optimizing the critical environmental factors is essential for the development of mixed algal cultures for lipid
production. Design of experimental (DOE) methodology using Taguchi orthogonal array (OA) was applied to
evaluate the influence and specific function of eight important factors (Carbon(Glucose), Nitrates, Phosphates,
Trace metal(Fe), pH,Salinity and Light) on lipid production. Three levels of factor variations were selected, which
represent the experimentation size by symbolic arrays of matrix (L18-18 experimental trails) with an OA layout of
21×37. All the eight factors were assigned with three levels except for nutrient stress operation (21). The most
influential factor was light, accounting for 16.8% of the overall variance followed by carbon supplementation
(12.8%) and nutrient stress (9.3%). pH, phosphates and trace metals showed zero influence on the production
process with respect to variance. Altogether, light, carbon and nutrient stress contributed a majority of 38.9% at
their individual levels on the total lipid production indicating that these factors played critical role in the
optimization. The validation experiments performed with the obtained optimized conditions showed enhanced
total lipid production of 31.9%.
Keywords: Design of experimental (DOE), orthogonal array (OA).
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