Nitrate Reductase Inhibition Induces Lipid Enhancement of Dunaliella Tertiolecta for Biodiesel Production

Nitrogen stress increases lipids content in microalgae, the main feedstock for algal biodiesel. Sodium tungstate was used in this study to implement nitrogen stress by inhibiting nitrate reductase (NR) in Dunaliella tertiolecta. The reduction of NR activity was accompanied by reduction of chlorophyll and accumulation of lipids. One-stage and two-stage culture strategies were compared. One-stage culture raised total lipids from 18% (control) to 39% (w: w); however, two-stage culture raised lipids to 50% in which neutral lipids were enhanced 2.14 times. To assess the quality of biodiesel produced, fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) composition was studied. It showed a slight variation of unsaturation. In addition, some physical proprieties of biodiesel were estimated and showed that higher heating values were improved by tungstate treatment. In this study, we tried to shed light on some biological impact of NR inhibition in microalgae cells using sodium tungstate which could be exploited in the improvement of biodiesel production.