Characterization of agarophytic seaweeds from the biorefinery context

• Published in: Bioresource technology Vol. 159; pp. 280 - 285
• Main Authors: Baghel, Ravi S., Reddy, C.R.K., Jha, Bhavanath
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Kidlington Elsevier Ltd 01-05-2014; Elsevier
• Subjects: Agar; Agar - chemistry; Agarophytes; Biological and medical sciences; Biotechnology - methods; Cellulose; Cellulose - analysis; Drying; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Iron; Lipids; Lipids - analysis; Minerals - analysis; Pigments; Pigments, Biological - analysis; Protein; Proteins; Proteins - analysis; Refining; Seaweed - chemistry; Seaweeds; Spectrum Analysis; Temperature; Agar; Pigments; Protein; Cellulose; Agarophytes; Biorefinery; Alga
• ISSN: 0960-8524; 1873-2976
• DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2014.02.083

•Characterization of agarophytic seaweed biomass for commercial products.•Investigated seaweeds contained good amount of industrially important pigments.•Appreciable amount of macro and micro-minerals were estimated.•Investigated seaweeds contained good quantity of protein and cellulose.•Low lipid contents and higher agar contents were determined.
The major seaweed components such as natural colorants (R-phycoerythrin (R-PE), R-phycocyanin (R-PC)), minerals, proteins, lipids, cellulose and agar which are of considerable commercial value were estimated in 15 different agarophytic seaweeds. R-PE and R-PC contents ranged from 138.33±17.67 to 1039.43±27.65μg/g and 50.26±6.63 to 818.2±48μg/g on fresh weight (fw) basis, respectively. Appreciable amounts of both macro-minerals (K, Na, Ca, Mg) and micro-minerals (Fe, Zn, Se, Mn) were estimated. The total lipid and protein contents were 0.65±0.06% to 1.53±0.07% and 4.75±0.5% to 19.31±3.5% on dry weight (dw) basis respectively while cellulose and agar contents varied from 3.7±0.13% to 12.20±0.45% and 9.17±0.62% to 25.23±0.50% dw, respectively. The overall finding of this study enable the selection and value addition of agarophytic feedstock for biorefinery.