-C-Phycocyanin is a natural blue dye used in food and pharmaceutical industry. In the present study, a simple and efficient method to extract C-phycocyanin from Spirulina platensis wet biomass is reported. The extractions were carried out using six different methods, including chemical (organic and inorganic acid treatment), physical (freezing and thawing, sonication, homogenization) and enzymatic (lysozyme treatment) methods. The extraction using ultrasonic bath in the presence of glass pearls in the biomass proved to be the most efficient method, 56% higher than using freezing and thawing (the method most frequently used), and presented a extraction yield of 43.75 mg.g -1 and a C-phycocyanin concentration of 0.21 mg.mL -1.

A variety of techniques have been developed for the separation and recovery of proteins. The cost of purifying the product is frequently determined by the desired quality of the final product, which is evaluated by measuring the purity. In this work the design of a protein purification process for C-phycocyanin, a phycobiliprotein that can be used in the food and medical industries, was established. The study evaluated the use of ammonium sulfate precipitation, ion exchange chromatography and gel filtration to purify C-phycocyanin in a variety of sequences. The final design included the C-phycocyanin extraction step, precipitation with ammonium sulfate and ion exchange chromatography. When the elution step was studied, the kind of elution and pH were considered in order to obtain a product with a final purity of 4.0 with a purification factor of 6.35, so that, at the end of the strategy, C-phycocyanin of analytical grade would be obtained.

C‐phycocyanin (C‐PC), a natural blue dye, has been used in food, immunodiagnostics and analytical reagents. In this paper, the optimization of the two‐stage extraction of C‐PC from Spirulina platensis cells was studied. First, the biomass underwent different treatments for cell disruption, including drying, freezing and milling at different levels, and the extraction was then carried out using fixed time, impeller rotational speed and biomass‐to‐solvent ratio. Having defined the cell rupture conditions, the extraction process was optimized, evaluating the effects of impeller rotational speed and biomass‐to‐solvent ratio with time using a factorial design and response surface techniques. The results were evaluated as functions of C‐PC concentration, purity and extraction yield. The optimum conditions for extracting C‐PC from dried, frozen biomass, milled to a small diameter, were an extraction time of 1 h, a biomass‐to‐solvent ratio 0.16:1, and without agitation, obtaining a C‐PC concentration of 13.20 mg/mL, purity of 0.603 and extraction yield of 82.48 mg/g. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS This manuscript reports the extraction of C‐phycocyanin (C‐PC) using a method that can be scaled up. C‐PC can be used as a natural blue dye in the food industry as a substitute for artificial dyes, with the advantage that C‐PC is healthier and extracted from algal biomass. This paper presents the use of a complete factorial design to optimize the extraction of C‐PC from cyanobacteria using a procedure without the use of chemical products. This product can be used in foods, or suffer purification for use in the pharmaceutical industry since it shows some medical properties such as anti‐inflammatory and antitumoral effects.

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C-ficocianina é um pigmento natural azul que pode ser utilizado como aditivo alimentar e na indústria farmacêutica. Esse trabalho visou obter C-ficocianina com aumento na pureza e sem perdas na recuperação, empregando a técnica da precipitação. O extrato bruto de C-ficocianina foi utilizado nos ensaios. A otimização da purificação foi feita através de um planejamento experimental, no qual avaliou-se a concentração de sulfato de amônio, o volume e o pH de tampão de re-suspensão. Subseqüentemente, um estudo da purificação utilizando o fracionamento com sulfato de amônio foi realizado nas melhores condições encontradas no planejamento experimental. As condições mais favoráveis para a purificação foram obtidas quando foi utilizado fracionamento com sulfato de amônio na faixa 0-20%/20-50%, relação volume de re-suspensão/volume inicial de 0,52 e tampão pH 7,0. Nessas condições, em um único passo de purificação, a pureza aumentou 70% comparado ao extrato inicial e a recuperação foi de 83,8%.C-phycocyanin is a natural blue dye that has been used as an additive in food and can be used to produce medications. The major goal of the present study was to obtain C-phycocyanin under the best operational conditions for high C-phycocyanin recovery and purity using the precipitation technique. Crude C-phycocyanin from Spirulina platensis was used. Optimization of the purification was carried out using experimental design. The effect of ammonium sulfate concentration, volume and of pH for resuspension were evaluated. Subsequently an ammonium sulfate fractionation study was carried out using the most suitable conditions found in the experimental design. The best purification condition was ammonium sulfate fractionation at 0-20%/20-50%, in relation to a resuspension volume/initial volume of 0.52 in a 7.0 pH buffer. Under these conditions, in an one-step purification only, the purity increased 70% compared to the initial extract, with an 83.8% recovery.