Microwave support of the alcoholic fermentation process of cyanobacteria Arthrospira platensis

The search for a balance between the energy-related challenges of the future and providing nutritional security has resulted in the development of a market for biofuels of successive generations. The larger their portion in biofuel production, the less the prices of agricultural products will increase. The use of algae, cyanobacteria and aquatic plants in the production of liquid fuels is an alternative. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of thermal hydrolysis on degradation of polysaccharides contained in biomass of cyanobacteria Arthrospira platensis and to assess the effectiveness of ethanol production from preconditioned biomass. The study is aimed at the selection of the most advantageous parameters of thermochemical hydrolysis to reach the experiment variant with the best effects, degree of polysaccharide degradation and effectiveness of alcohol fermentation. The experiment was divided into two stages; in stage I, the possibility of obtaining fermentable sugars by hydrothermal and chemical treatment of the substrate was tested. Stage II involved an assessment of the effectiveness of the pretreatment methods to produce bioethanol in alcohol fermentation. Yeast used in industrial ethanol production-Saccharomyces cerevisiae As4-was used in the alcohol fermentation. The results have shown that the temperature of 150 °C was the most beneficial for the process of thermohydrolysis, and the mash in the microwave-heated sample contained the highest concentration of alcohol (0.97 g/l), which is 98% more than in the control mash and 37% more than in the conventionally heated sample.