Estimating Biomass and Vitality of Microalgae for Monitoring Cultures: A Roadmap for Reliable Measurements

Estimating algal biomass is a prerequisite for monitoring growth of microalgae. Especially for large-scale production sites, the measurements must be robust, reliable, fast and easy to obtain. We compare the relevant parameters, discuss potential hurdles and provide recommendations to tackle these issues. The focus is on optical density and in vivo autofluorescence of chlorophyll, which have proven to be ideal candidates for monitoring purposes. Beyond biomass, cell vitality is also crucial for maintaining cultures. While maximizing biomass yield is often the primary consideration, some applications require adverse growth conditions for the synthesis of high-quality compounds. The non-invasive technique of pulse-amplified modulated (PAM) fluorescence measurements provides an ideal tool and is increasingly being employed due to ever more affordable devices. We compared three devices and studied the robustness of the dark fluorescence yield of photosystem II (Fv/Fm) at various cell densities. Although the so-called inner filter effects influence the fluorescence signal, the resulting Fv/Fm remain stable and robust over a wide range of cell densities due to mutual effects.