Photobioreactors for the production of microalgae

Microalgae are produced today for human and animal markets, as food-feed and source of active compounds. Microalgae can be also used in wastewater treatment and they has been proposed as biofuels source to reduce global warming problem. Whatever the final application of microalgae its production is based on the same principles as light availability, enough mass and heat transfer and adequate control of culture parameters. In this paper these principals are revised. Moreover, the production must be carried out at adequate scale using photobioreactors. Design of photobioreactor is determined by the final use of biomass and quality required. Different designs today used are revised, including last designs proposed, identifying his characteristics parameters and applications. In addition, the obligation of adequate control strategies is discussed. Finally, the bottlenecks for the scale-up of the different technologies and thus of microalgae production are summarized.