Bioenergy Production from Algae

Dear Colleagues,

There is a growing need to meet our energy demands through sustainable methods with minimal impact on our environment. In particular, ways to minimize carbon emissions are urgently needed. One potential route to achieve this, especially for transportation fuel, is to harness the power of algae biotechnology. Algae are photosynthetic microorganisms that can be used to convert solar energy into biological or chemical forms of energy, and develop processes that are potentially carbon neutral, or even those with a carbon deficit. Algae also offer viable routes for harnessing solar energy in the form of chemical energy that is suitable for storage and transportation. Whilst the more popular conceptual route to energy generation from algae has been using it to accumulate lipids and produce biodiesel, algae can potentially be employed to derive other forms of energy too. These include hydrogen production by cyanobacteria, and the use of algae biomass as a carbon neutral feedstock in biochemical conversion routes to produce biogas, bioethanol or biobutanol, or thermochemical conversion routes to produce bio-oil, syngas and combustible carbon. There are technological challenges in each of these routes, with respect to achieving economic and environmental sustainability in the process adopted to serve as a viable alternative to fossil fuel-derived energy. Challenges include maximizing carbon uptake by algae, maximizing yields of desired products, and engineering sustainable solutions. This Special Issue focuses on current technical advances in algal biotechnology that would bring the different options closer to the reality of sustainable energy generation.

Dr. Raman Vaidyanathan
Guest Editor

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• algal carbon sequestration
• biomass and biofuels
• hydrothermal liquefaction
• transportation fuels
• synthetic biology
• metabolic engineering
• biomass harvesting
• microbial fuel cells
• microbial consortia
• renewable energy