Pressurized Liquid Extraction of Pigments from Chlamydomonas sp. and Chemical Characterization by HPLC-MS/MS

Pressurized liquid extraction using green solvents (ethanol and water) was applied to extract photosynthetic pigments from the microalgae Chlamydomonas sp. An experimental design is employed to determine the effect of the extraction conditions on the extraction yield and the antioxidant capacity of the different extracts determined using 1,1-diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl and TEAC tests. All the extracts show significant antioxidant activity in all assays. Besides, in this work, the carotenoid and chlorophyll composition of the Chlamydomonas extracts was analyzed by HPLC-DAD-APCI-MS/MS for the first time, being the main compounds lutein and pheophythin a '.