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U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Clean fuels from bioconversion of solar energy. Annual report, 21 January 1980-20 January 1981

Technical Report ·
OSTI ID:5489350

The study seeks to enhance glycolic acid excretion by unicellular algae. The strains of algae selected to evaluate glycolic acid accumulation in culture medium were: Chlorella pyrenoidosa (UTEX 395), Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (UTEX 89), Scenedesmus obliquus (UTEX 393), and Ankistrodesmus braunii (UTEX 245). C. pyrenoidosa and C. reinhardtii, based on the amount of glycolic acid produced, were selected for further study. Initial experiments were conducted to measure the effect of different environmental growth conditions on the rate of glycolic accumulation in defined culture medium. The most pronounced effect on glycolic acid excretion was obtained by varying the concentration of carbon dioxide in air. At 1% CO2 in air, C. pyrenoidosa accumulated 5.2 ppm glycolic acid in culture medium. Neither the pH of the culture medium nor the incubation temperature affected glycolic acid accumulation by growing C. pyrenoidosa cultures.

Research Organization:
Syracuse Univ. Research Corp., NY (USA)
OSTI ID:
5489350
Report Number(s):
PB-81-227977
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English