• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.33 no.5
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• pp.314-324
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• 2011

Algal biomass cultivated by wastewater is potentially useful resource for biodiesel production. However, little is known about algal nutrient metabolism and microbial interaction with bacteria under real municipal wastewater condition. In this work, we characterized nitrogen and phosphorus removals of municipal wastewater by a representative wastewater-growing algal population. Ankistrodesmus gracilis SAG 278-2, and analyzed its ecological interaction with wastewater bacterial communities. Compared to wastewater sludge itself, algal-bacterial co-culture improved nutrient removal. According to bacterial community analysis with 16S rRNA genes, a selective and dominant growth of a Unclassified Alcaligenaceae population resulted from algal growth in the algal-bacterial co-culture. The selectively stimulated bacterial population is phylogenetically close to Alcaligenes faecalis subsp. 5659-H, which is known to be co-present interact with algae in aquatic environment. These findings suggest that algal growth/metabolism may have effects on selection of a specific bacterial population in algal-bacterial co-cultures that can efficiently remove nutrients from municipal wastewater.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.23 no.10
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• pp.1472-1477
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• 2013

Microalgae have been regarded as a natural resource for sustainable materials and fuels, as well as for removal of nutrients and micropollutants from wastewater, and their interaction with bacteria in wastewater is a critical factor to consider because of the microbial diversity and complexity in a variety of wastewater conditions. Despite their importance, very little is known about the ecological interactions between algae and bacteria in a wastewater environment. In this study, we characterized the wastewater bacterial community in response to the growth of a Selenastrum gracile UTEX 325 population in a real municipal wastewater environment. The Roche 454 GS-FLX Titanium pyrosequencing technique was used for indepth analysis of amplicons of 16S rRNA genes from different conditions in each reactor, with and without the algal population. The algal growth reduced the bacterial diversity and affected the bacterial community structure in the wastewater. The following in-depth analysis of the deep-sequenced amplicons showed that the algal growth selectively stimulated Sphingobacteria class members, especially the Sediminibacterium genus population, in the municipal wastewater environment.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.33 no.11
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• pp.847-854
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• 2011

To deal with issues from global climate changes, renewable bioenergy has become important. Algae have been regarded as a good resource for biorefinery and bioenergy, and also have potential capability to remove nutrient and non-decompositional pollutants for wastewater advanced treatment. Although algal-bacterial ecological interaction would be a crucially important factor in using algae for wastewater advanced treatment and resource recovery from wastewater, very little is known about ecological interaction between algae and bacteria in a real wastewater environment. In this study, under a real municipal wastewater condition, we characterized wastewater pollutant treatability and bacterial communities in response to growth of Ankistrodesmus gracilis SAG278-2, which can grow in wastewater and has a high lipid contents. The growth of algal population using the wastewater was inhibited by increase in wastewater bacteria while bacterial survival and cellular decay rate were not influenced by the algal growth. Removals of recalcitrant organic matters and total nitrogen were improved in the presence of algal growth. According to T-RFLP and statistical analysis, algal growth affected time-course changes in bacterial community structures. The following 16S rRNA gene amplicon, cloning results showed that the algal growth changes in bacterial community structure, and that bacterial populations belonging to Sediminibacterium, Sphingobacterium, Mucilaginibacter genera were identified as cooperative with the algal growth in the wastewater.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.387-397
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• 2021

There is growing interest in the production of microalgae-based, high-value by-products as an emerging green biotechnology. However, a cultivation platform for Oocystis sp. has yet to be established. We therefore examined the effects of bacterial culture additions on the growth and production of valuable compounds of the microalgal strain Oocystis sp. KNUA044, isolated from a locally adapted region in Korea. The strain grew only in the presence of a clear supernatant of Sphingomonas sp. KNU100 culture solution and generated 28.57 mg/l/d of biomass productivity. Protein content (43.9 wt%) was approximately two-fold higher than carbohydrate content (29.4 wt%) and lipid content (13.9 wt%). Oocystis sp. KNUA044 produced the monosaccharide fucose (33 ㎍/mg and 0.94 mg/l/d), reported here for the first time. Fatty acid profiling showed high accumulation (over 60%) of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) compared to saturated (29.4%) and monounsaturated fatty acids (9.9%) under the same culture conditions. Of these PUFAs, the algal strain produced the highest concentration of linolenic acid (C18:3 ω3; 40.2%) in the omega-3 family and generated eicosapentaenoic acid (C20:5 ω3; 6.0%), also known as EPA. Based on these results, we suggest that the application of Sphingomonas sp. KNU100 for strain-dependent cultivation of Oocystis sp. KNUA044 holds future promise as a bioprocess capable of increasing algal biomass and high-value bioactive by-products, including fucose and PUFAs such as linolenic acid and EPA.

• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.194-202
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• 2003

To isolate alga-lytic bacteria, a number of samples were collected from Lake of Sukchon and Pal'tang reservoir where cyanobacteria blooming occurred. HY0210-AK1, which exhibited high alga-lytic activity, was isolated using Anabaena cylindrica lawn. The morphological and biochemical characteristics of the isolate HY0210-AK1 were very similar to that of the genus Rhizobium. Taxonomic identification including 16S rDNA base sequencing and phylogenetic analysis indicated that the isolate Hy0210-AK1 had a 99.1% homology in its 16S rDNA babe sequence with Sphingobium herbicidovorans. A. cylindrica NIES-19 was susceptible to the alga-lytic bacterial attack. The growth-inhibiting offset of the bacterium was not different on A. cylindrica NIES-19 when Sphingobium herbicidovorans HY0210-AK1 was in the lag, exponential, and stationary growth phase, although the alga-Iytic effect of S. herbici-dovorans HY0210-AK1 that in stationary growth phase was somewhat pronounced at the first time of inoculation. When S. herbicidovorans HY0210-AK1 was inoculated was inoculated with $1\times 10^{8}$ CFU $ml^{-1}$ together with A cylindrica NIES-19, the bacterium proliferated and caused algal lysis. A. cylindrica NIES-19 died when S. herbicidovorans HY0210 AKl was added to the algal culture but not when duly the filtrates from the bacterial culture was added. This suggests that extracellular substances are not responsible for inhibition of A. cylindrica NIES-19 and that algal Iysis largely attributed to direct interaction between S. herbicidovorans HY0210-AK1 and A. cylindrica NIES-19. The alga-lytic bacterium HY0210-AK1 caused cell lysis and death of three strain of Micro-cystis aeruginosa, but revealed no alga-Iytic effects on the Stephanodiscus hantzschii.