Effect of Alkali Addition on Flocculation Behavior of Synechococcus Sp. in Different Cell Concentrations

Microalgae are photosynthetic organisms, which could be used for different applications like biodiesel production, wastewater treatment, producing biodiesel, feedstock for aquaculture, and harvesting for extractionof various chemicals like beta-carotene. To separate microalgae, utilization of conventional separationtechniques is inapplicable which leads to use of flocculation process as a pre-treatment before final separationmethod. In the current work, pH-induced flocculation for separation of Synechococcus Sp., a Cyanobacterium microalga was investigated and effect of different concentrations of alkali in microalgae medium with differentinitial optical densities of 0.96 and 1.75 were observed. According to next stage of separation, it is concluded that for higher volumes of Synechococcus Sp., flocculation is better to be performed with lower concentrations of NaOH, up to 2 g/l along with filtration as next step. For lower volumes of Synechococcus Sp. to be treated, higher concentrations of NaOH, more than 2.4 g/L will be more promising with centrifugation as downstream separation method.

Keywords:

Ichec 14 , English Abstract , pH-induced flocculation , microalgae , Synechococcus Sp