An Easily Accessible Microfluidic Chip for High-Throughput Microalgae Screening for Biofuel Production

Shubhanvit Mishra, Yi-Ju Liu, Chi-Shuo Chen and Da-Jeng Yao
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Shubhanvit Mishra: Institute of Nano Engineering and MicroSystems, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan
Yi-Ju Liu: Food Industry Research and Development Institute, Hsinchu 300193, Taiwan
Chi-Shuo Chen: Department of Biomedical Engineering and Environmental Sciences, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan
Da-Jeng Yao: Institute of Nano Engineering and MicroSystems, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 7, 1-10

Abstract: Microalgae are important green energy resources. With high efficiency in fixing carbon dioxide, microalgae are broadly applied for biofuel production. Integrating various cultivation parameters, we applied ultraviolet (UV) mutagenesis, one of the most common approaches, to induce genomic mutation in microalgae and thus enhance the production of lipid content, but the screening process is convoluted and labor-intensive. In this study, we aimed to develop an accessible microfluidic platform to optimize the biofuel production of microalgae. Instead of traditional lithography, we designed hanging-drop microfluidic chips that were fabricated using a cheap computer numerical control (CNC) micro-milling technique. On each chip, we cultured in parallel Botryococcus braunii , one of the most common freshwater microalgae for biofuel production, in sets of ten separated hanging drops (~30 µL each); we monitored their growth in each individual drop for more than 14 days. To optimize the culturing conditions, using drops of varied diameter, we first identified the influence of cell density on algae growth and lipid production. After introducing UV-induced random mutations, we quantified the lipid content of the microalgae in situ ; the optimized UV-C dosage was determined accordingly. In comparison with wild-type B. braunii , the results showed increased biomass growth (137%) and lipid content (149%) of the microalgae mutated with the desired UV process. Moreover, we showed a capacity to modulate the illumination on an addressed chip area. In summary, without using an external pump system, we developed a hanging-drop microfluidic system for long-term microalgae culturing, which can be easily operated using laboratory pipettes. This microfluidic system is expected to facilitate microalgae mutation breeding, and to be applied for algae cultivation optimization.

Keywords: biofuel; microfluidic; microalgae; UV mutagenesis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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