Production of Phycocyanin from Marine Cyanobacteria in Open Raceway Pond

Phycocyanin is one of the major light harvesting accessory pigment present in microalgae and cyanobacteria. This water-soluble pigment protein exhibits antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and neuroprotective effects. Application of this pigment has also been used in dietary nutritional supplements in many food, nutraceutical, cosmetic, and biotechnology industries. In the present study phycocyanin was extracted from locally isolated marine cyanobacteria Geitlerinema sp. Geitlerinema sp. showed a higher growth during the summer perioed of 0.75 g/L and 0.54 g/L. Similarly, the maximum Phycocyanin obtained was up to 7.1% during summer period.

Stability of Phycocyanin Extracted from Spirulina maxima in different pH from Indoor and Semioutdoor Cultivation

Spirulina maxima is a blue-green microalga that rich of pigment. The pigments in S. maxima grouped into primary pigment (Chlorophyll a) and accessory pigments (carotenoid & phycobiliprotein). Phycocyanin is an accessory pigment belongs to phycobiliprotein, blue colored, and can be used as natural food coloring and drugs. Phycocyanin has activities as antibacterial, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antihyperalgesic and many more. Because of that, phycocyanin usually used in the pharmaceutical industry. However, phycocyanin is a protein that unstable under lights, high temperature, and pH in the storage. The aim of this research is to obtain information about the effect of pH on the stability of phycocyanin extracted from S. maxima that cultivated in indoor and semi-outdoor. The steps are cultivation, extraction using different solutions to get blue pigment phycocyanin, and stability test. Phycocyanin was dissolved in buffer solution at pH 4.0, 4.5, 5.0, 5.5, 6.0, 6.5, and 7.0 for 7 days. Color observations and concentration measurements are carried out every day to see changes in phycocyanin. Growth in indoor cultivation with 24 hours light is faster than semi-outdoor a that uses only sunlight. Cultivation gets the optical density value 0,6 at day 20 with indoor cultivation and day 34 with semi-outdoor cultivation. Results show that phycocyanin can be extracted using buffer phosphate solution. The stability of the pigments can be seen from the color changes and relative concentration using a spectrophotometer. Phycocyanin shows stable in the storage of pH 4 until pH 5.5. The highest relative concentration (CR) was shown in pH 5.

Landsat 8 Virtual Orange Band for Mapping Cyanobacterial Blooms

The Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) has a panchromatic band (503–676 nm) that can be used to derive a novel virtual orange band (590–635 nm) by using the multispectral green band and red band components. The orange band is useful for the accurate detection and quantification of phycocyanin (PC), an accessory pigment in toxin-producing cyanobacterial blooms, because of the specific light absorption characteristics of PC around 600–625 nm. In this study, we compared the Landsat 8 OLI’s and Sentinel-3 Ocean and Land Color Instrument’s (OLCI) derived orange band reflectance and PC products corresponding to a same-date overpass during a severe cyanobacterial bloom in Lake Erie, USA. The goal was to determine if the OLI’s virtual orange band can produce results equivalent to the OLCI’s actual orange band. Band-by-band match-ups used the OLI’s top-of-atmosphere (TOA) reflectance versus TOA reflectance from the OLCI, and surface reflectance (SR) from the OLI versus SR from the OLCI. A significant correlation was observed between the OLI’s and OLCI’s derived orange band TOA reflectance (R2 = 0.86; p < 0.001; NRMSE = 9.01%) and orange band SR (R2 = 0.93; p < 0.001; NRMSE = 20.23%). The PC map produced using the best-fit empirical models from both sensors showed similar PC spatial patterns and concentration levels in the western basin of Lake Erie. The results from this research are particularly important for the study of smaller inland waterbodies with the 30 m resolution of the OLI, which cannot be studied with the 300 m resolution of OLCI data, and for analyzing historical bloom events before the launch of the OLCI. Although more analysis and validation need to be conducted, this study opens up Landsat 8’s applicability in research on cyanobacterial harmful algal blooms (cyanoHABs).

Microalgal pigments and their relation with phytoplankton carbon biomass on the northeastern Mediterranean Sea shore, with special emphasis on nanophytoplankton

Summary Marker pigments are used as a proxy for biomass of distinct phytoplankton classes in different oceanic regions. However, sometimes disagreements are observed between microscopy and accessory-pigment based approaches in distinct regions mainly due to changing environmental factors governing diversity and structure of community composition. In this study, concordance between microscopy and HPLC-CHEMTAX methods were investigated first time in coastal waters of Erdemli, Turkey, in the Levantin Basin of the northeastern Mediterranean Sea by weekly intervals during 2015-2016. According to our results, marker pigment of diatoms, fucoxanthin, which was the most prominent pigment in the study area during most of the year, was a better indicator of diatom abundance than diatom carbon biomass. CHEMTAX derived values of diatom chlorophyll a (Chl a) were not in concert with either abundance or carbon biomass of this group. Contribution of dinoflagellates and cryptophytes to the phytoplankton community was underestimated with pigment based approach. Accessory pigment of cyanophytes, zeaxanthin, was also an important pigment in the samples. Biomass of haptophytes seemed to be overestimated by HPLC-CHEMTAX analysis. In contrast to diatoms, CHEMTAX derived chlorophyll a values of cryptophytes were correlated with abundance of this group but not with alloxanthin. Inclusion of live counts of nanoplanktic cryptophytes, haptophytes and prasinophytes provided a better correlation between microscopy and pigment based results. According to CHEMTAX analysis, nanoplankton and picoplankton constituted ∼55% of Chl a in the region.

Parameterization of phytoplankton spectral absorption coefficients in the Baltic Sea: general, monthly and two-component variants of approximation formulas

This paper presents approximate formulas (empirical equations) for parameterizing the coefficient of light absorption by phytoplankton aph(λ) in Baltic Sea surface waters. Over a thousand absorption spectra (in the 350–750 nm range), recorded during 9 years of research carried out in different months of the year and in various regions of the southern and central Baltic, were used to derive these parameterizations. The empirical material was characterized by a wide range of variability: the total chlorophyll a concentration (Tchl a) varied between 0.31 and 142 mg m−3, the ratio of the sum of all accessory pigment concentrations to chlorophyll a (∑Ci/Tchla) ranged between 0.21 and 1.5, and the absorption coefficients aph(λ) at individual light wavelengths varied over almost 3 orders of magnitude. Different versions of the parameterization formulas were derived on the basis of these data: a one-component parameterization in the “classic” form of a power function with Tchl a as the only variable and a two-component formula – the product of the power and exponential functions – with Tchl a and ∑Ci/Tchla as variables. We found distinct differences between the general version of the one-component parameterization and its variants derived for individual months of the year. In contrast to the general variant of parameterization, the new two-component variant takes account of the variability of pigment composition occurring throughout the year in Baltic phytoplankton populations.

Effects of Astaxanthin on the Proliferation and Migration of Breast Cancer Cells In Vitro

Astaxanthin (ASX) is a marine-based ketocarotenoid; an accessory pigment in plants in that it has many different potential functions. ASX is an antioxidant that is notably more potent than many other antioxidants. Antioxidants have anti-inflammatory and oxidative stress-reducing properties to potentially reduce the incidence of cancer or inhibit the expansion of tumor cells. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that ASX would inhibit proliferation and migration of breast cancer cells in vitro. We found that application of ASX significantly reduced proliferation rates and inhibited breast cancer cell migration compared to control normal breast epithelial cells. Based on these results, further investigation of the effects of ASX on not only breast cancer cells, but other forms of tumor cells, should be carried out.

Parameterization of the spectral light absorption coefficient of phytoplankton in the Baltic Sea: general, monthly and two-component variants of approximation formulas

The paper presents approximate formulas for parameterizing the coefficient of light absorption by phytoplankton aph(λ) in Baltic Sea surface waters. Over a thousand absorption spectra (in the 350–750 nm range), recorded during nine years of research carried out in different months of the year and in various regions of the southern and central Baltic, were used to derive these parameterizations. The analysed empirical material was characterized by a wide range of variability: the total chlorophyll a concentration (Tchla) varied between 0.3 and > 140 mg m−3, the ratio of the sum of all accessory pigment concentrations to chlorophyll a (ΣCi / Tchla) varied between 0.21 and 1.5, and the absorption coefficients aph(λ) at individual light wavelengths varied over almost three orders of magnitude. Different versions of the parameterization formulas were derived on the basis of the data gathered: a one-component parameterization in the classic form of a power function with Tchla as the only variable, and a two-component formula – the product of the power and exponential functions, with Tchla and ΣCi / Tchla as variables. There were distinct differences between the general version of the one-component parameterization and its variants developed for individual months of the year. In contrast to the general parameterization, both the monthly and the two-component variants enable, at least partially, the variability of pigment composition occurring throughout the year in the Baltic phytoplankton populations examined here to be taken into account.