A multi-omic characterization of temperature stress in a halotolerant Scenedesmus strain for algal biotechnology

Abstract

Microalgae efficiently convert sunlight into lipids and carbohydrates, offering bio-based alternatives for energy and chemical production. Improving algal productivity and robustness against abiotic stress requires a systems level characterization enabled by functional genomics. Here, we characterize a halotolerant microalga Scenedesmus sp. NREL 46B-D3 demonstrating peak growth near 25 °C that reaches 30 g/m2/day and the highest biomass accumulation capacity post cell division reported to date for a halotolerant strain. Functional genomics analysis revealed that genes involved in lipid production, ion channels and antiporters are expanded and expressed. Exposure to temperature stress shifts fatty acid metabolism and increases amino acids synthesis. Co-expression analysis shows that many fatty acid biosynthesis genes are overexpressed with specific transcription factors under cold stress. These and other genes involved in the metabolic and regulatory response to temperature stress can be further explored for strain improvement.

Multi-Omics Profiling Reveals Resource Allocation and Acclimation Strategies to Temperature Changes in a Marine Dinoflagellate

“…The four accumulated amino acids in P. shikokuense at 19℃ may play the same role. Indeed, greater GABA accumulation at low temperature acclimation has been reported in plants and green algae (65)(66)(67). In addition, asparagine is an ideal N storage compound that exhibits a high N:C ratio compared with other amino acids (68).…”

Comparative transcriptomic and lipidomic analyses indicate that cold stress enhanced the production of the long C18–C22 polyunsaturated fatty acids in Aurantiochytrium sp.

“…( Zheng et al, 2021 ), Cylindrotheca closterium ( Almeyda et al, 2020 ), Isochrysis galbana ( Cao et al, 2020 ), Nannochloropsis salina ( Gill et al, 2018 ), and Scenedesmus sp. ( Calhoun et al, 2021 ) to investigate its effects on the yield of fatty acids (summarized as Supplementary Table 1 ). Low temperature such as 5°C was also used to stimulate lipids synthesis in various algae and microorganism ( Lu et al, 2009 ; Sirisuk et al, 2018 ; Qin et al, 2021 ).…”

Applicability of water from the Bay of Gdańsk as a growth medium for mixotrophic culture of Platymonas subcordiformis

“…Therefore, there have been attempts to identify relatively cheap methods which would harness various types of sewage, leachate, industrial effluent or waste water [21]. Use of natural water as growth medium is a novel area of research that very few papers have dealt with so far [22]. The vast majority of the data available pertain to producing microalgal biomass on media prepared from distilled water and chemical reagents that provide optimal conditions for microalgal growth [23,24].…”