Characterization of aqueous phase from the hydrothermal liquefaction of Chlorella pyrenoidosa

Chao Gai; Yuanhui Zhang; Wan-Ting Chen; Yan Zhou; Lance Schideman; Peng Zhang; Giovana Tommaso; Chih-Ting Kuo; Yuping Dong

doi:10.1016/j.biortech.2014.10.118

Characterization of aqueous phase from the hydrothermal liquefaction of Chlorella pyrenoidosa

Bioresour Technol. 2015 May:184:328-335. doi: 10.1016/j.biortech.2014.10.118. Epub 2014 Nov 6.

Authors

Chao Gai¹, Yuanhui Zhang², Wan-Ting Chen³, Yan Zhou³, Lance Schideman³, Peng Zhang³, Giovana Tommaso⁴, Chih-Ting Kuo³, Yuping Dong⁵

Affiliations

¹ Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 18 Shuangqing Road, Beijing 100085, PR China.
² Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA. Electronic address: yzhang1@illinois.edu.
³ Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA.
⁴ Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL 61801, USA; Laboratory of Environmental Biotechnology, Department of Food Engineering, University of Sao Paulo, 225, Duque de Caxias Norte, Pirassununga, Sao Paulo 13635-900, Brazil.
⁵ Key Laboratory of High Efficiency and Clean Mechanical Manufacture, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Shandong University, Jinan 250061, PR China.

PMID: 25466993
DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2014.10.118

Abstract

This study investigated the characteristics of aqueous phase from hydrothermal liquefaction of low-lipid microalgae Chlorella pyrenoidosa. The interactions of operating conditions, including reaction temperature, retention time and total solid ratio were evaluated by response surface methodology. The chemical oxygen demand, total nitrogen and total phosphorus were selected as indicators of the property of AP. Results indicated that total solid ratio was found to be the dominant factor affecting the nutrient recovery efficiencies of AP. Based on energy recovery, GC-MS indicated that the AP at two optimized operating conditions (280 °C, 60 min, 35 wt.% and 300 °C, 60 min, 25 wt.%) were observed to have a higher concentration of organic acids (10.35% and 8.34%) while the sample (260 °C, 30 min, 35 wt.%) was observed to have the highest concentration of N&O-heterocyclic compounds (36.16%).

Keywords: Aqueous product; Hydrothermal liquefaction; Low-lipid algae; Nitrogen recovery; Nutrient.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Analysis of Variance
Biological Oxygen Demand Analysis
Biotechnology / methods*
Chlorella / metabolism*
Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry
Hydrogen-Ion Concentration
Models, Theoretical
Nitrogen / analysis
Phosphorus / analysis
Temperature*
Water / pharmacology*

Substances

Water
Phosphorus
Nitrogen