Protein Extraction, Precipitation, and Recovery from Chlorella sorokiniana Using Mechanochemical Methods

Ashley Cutshaw, Henry Frost, Sibel Uludag-Demirer, Yan Liu and Wei Liao
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Ashley Cutshaw: Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
Henry Frost: Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
Sibel Uludag-Demirer: Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
Yan Liu: Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA
Wei Liao: Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 12, 1-11

Abstract: Protein extraction, precipitation, and recovery methods were evaluated by this study using a green alga— Chlorella sorokiniana . A mechanochemical cell disruption process was applied to facilitate protein extraction from microalgal biomass. Optimization of the mechanochemical process resulted in milling conditions that achieved a protein extraction of 52.7 ± 6.45%. The consequent acid precipitation method was optimized to recover 98.7% of proteins from the microalgal slurry. The measured protein content of the protein isolate was 41.4% w / w . These results indicate that the precipitation method is successful at recovering the extracted proteins in the algal slurry; however, the removal of non-protein solids during centrifugation and pH adjustment is not complete. The energy balance analysis elucidated that the energy demand of the protein extraction and recovery operation, at 0.83 MJ/kg dry algal biomass, is much lower than previous studies using high-pressure homogenization and membrane filtration. This study concludes that mechanochemical protein extraction and recovery is an effective, low-energy processing method, which could be used by algal biorefineries to prepare algal proteins for value-added chemical production as well as to make algal carbohydrates and lipids in the residual biomass more accessible for biofuel production.

Keywords: ball mill; protein; microalgae; fractionation; mass and energy balance (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: 2023
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