CO-CULTURE OF CHLORELLA VULGARIS AND ESCHERICHIA COLI ENHANCE INTRACELLULAR ORGANIC MATTER IN BIOFILM MODE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11113/aej.v15.21453Keywords:
Bacteria, Biofilm, Extracellular, Intracellular, MicroalgaeAbstract
Microalgal-bacterial biofilm studies over years often highlights challenges in biomass harvesting due to the larger pore sizes, grooves, or pores found on most of the supporting substrates, which trapped the cells easily, hence causing frequent maintenance or replacement with new batch of solid supporting materials. In light of this, the current work addresses this limitation by investigating the use of microporous membranes as a cultivation substrate for co-culture biofilms. A self-designed permeated system was employed to enable the cultivation of biofilms on these membranes throughout 15 days. Findings showed that cell density of C. vulgaris in the co-culture biofilm was at least three times higher than the monoculture control, peaking at approximately 49.84x1010±4.44x1010 cells m-2 on day 10. The total chlorophyll yield depicted by co-culture group shown an average of two-fold higher productivity than that of control. Additionally, co-culture system also demonstrated higher extracellular polysaccharide (380% higher at day 5) and protein (870% higher at day 15) levels. The presence of E. coli in co-culture undoubtedly stimulated algal metabolism through nutrient recycling or cross-feeding. Intracellularly, permeated biofilm system facilitated a remarkable accumulation of six- to nine-times higher as compared to their respective extracellular counterparts. Insights gained from this work would pave a way to the exploration of more potential co-culture systems in enhancing both the biomass and algal organic matter growth through symbiotic interactions with bacteria.
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