Scaling-up information from high-throughput pulsed light data to predict microalgae growth dynamics in photobioreactors

Single cell green algae (microalgae) have evolved to tap into the vast solar energy resource via photosynthesis to produce biomass, which is a feedstock for a broad array of products including foods, feeds, fuels, biomaterials and fine chemicals. Microalgae are therefore the chassis for an array of solar biotechnologies. In this study, we reformulated a photosynthetic unit model to capture the effect of light-dark cycles induced by self-shading and mixing in scaled-up systems. We calibrated and validated our model using High-Throughput Screening (HTS) data for Chlamydomonas reinhardtii under pulsed and continuous light regimes. By reconstructing the light history of individual cells migrating through a cultivation system, we established a link between HTS data and scaled-up systems, and validated the approach using published cultivation data. In a case study of an outdoor microalgae cultivation scenario we demonstrated how our model captures the dynamics of both incident solar irradian...