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Updated: Jan 19, 2026

Cultivation of Green Microalgae in Bubble Column Photobioreactors and an Assay for Neutral Lipids
Published on: January 7, 2019
Quorum-sensing mediated signals: A promising multi-functional modulators for separately enhancing algal yield and
Swati Das1, Sovik Das2, M M Ghangrekar3
1PK Sinha Centre for Bioenergy & Renewables, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur 721302, India.
Abstract:
Quorum-sensing molecules (QSMs) extracted from anaerobic sludge can help to enhance the overall productivity of algal culture, thus diminishing the per unit production cost of algae based-biofuel. In this investigation, QSMs extracted from anaerobic bacterial sludge of microbial fuel cell (MFC) was used to enhance the overall productivity of Chlorella sorokiniana cultivated in a separate bubble column photobioreactor. With the dosage of QSMs, algal biomass productivity and lipid content were increased by 2.25 times and 1.28 times, respectively. Further, lipid extracted biomass of quorum-sensing induced algae (LEB-QSA) was applied in anodic chamber of MFC to function as substrate and mediator, which enhanced the coulombic efficiency of this MFC by 74% as compared to the control MFC operated without LEB-QSA. Thus, this exploration demonstrated successful improvement in the macromolecular properties of algal culture dosed with QSMs and improved performance of MFC with the application of LEB-QSA as mediator and substrate.
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