Journal
JOURNAL OF PHYCOLOGY
Volume 47, Issue 2, Pages 313-323Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/j.1529-8817.2011.00963.x
Keywords
biofuel; carbohydrates; carbon allocation; FTIR spectroscopy; homeostasis; lipids; nitrogen; proteins
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Funding
- Fondazione Cariverona, Italy
- Italian Ministry for Agriculture and Forestry
- Southeast Wisconsin Energy Technology Research Center, USA
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An imbalance in the cellular C:N ratio may appreciably affect C allocation in algal cells. The consequences of these rearrangements of cellular pools on cell energetics, ecological fitness, and evolutionary trajectories are little known, although they are expected to be substantial. We investigated the fate of C in 11 microalgae cultured semicontinuously at three [NO3-] and constant pCO(2). We developed a new computational method for the semiquantitative use of Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy data for the determination of macromolecular composition. No obvious relationship was observed between the taxonomy and the allocation strategies adopted by the 11 species considered in this study. Not all species responded to a lower N availability by accumulating lipids or carbohydrates: Dunaliella parva W. Lerche and Thalassiosira pseudonana Hasle et Heimdal were homeostatic with respect to organic cell composition. A hyperbolic dependence of the lipid concentration from cell volume was observed. The level of reduction of organic constituents of green algae was parabolically related to size and was modulated in response to changes in N availability; the same was not true for the species bearing a red chloroplast. The above observations are discussed with respect to phytoplankton species composition and palatability for grazers, oleogenesis, and overall cell energetics.
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