Novel waveguide reactor design for enhancing algal biofilm growth

Engineering Photosynthetic Bioprocesses for Sustainable Chemical Production: A Review

“…Developing methods for improving light delivery in a closed system has been a focus in the field of algal technology and one which has extended to use for other photosynthetic organisms (Heimann, 2016;Nwoba et al, 2019). One of the techniques proposed for uniform light distribution is to grow cells on the surface on which light is incident using waveguide technology (Jung et al, 2012;Doud and Angenent, 2014;Genin et al, 2015;Delamare-Deboutteville et al, 2019;Nwoba et al, 2019). As the name suggests, a waveguide guides light from a light source and down the span of its surface allowing light to penetrate to the depths of a dark reactor and can also provide a surface to which cells can adhere.…”

Optimizing Light Distributions in a Membrane Photobioreactor via Optical Fibers To Enhance CO2 Photobiochemical Conversion by a Scenedesmus obliquus Biofilm

“…Recently, according to the relative position of microalgae cells and light source, bringing photons to light insufficient regions (i.e., the bottom layer of the biofilm) employing light-guiding materials or light-emitting media has been recognized as a promising approach to enhance the light intensity received by microalgae cells located at the bottom layer of the biofilm, − whereas the research focused on this field is yet relatively rare. For instance, Zhuang et al scattered the photobacteria within the Scenedesmus obliquus CPCC 157 biofilm serving as the inner light source and enhanced the biofilm growth by 19.79%.…”

“…For instance, Zhuang et al scattered the photobacteria within the Scenedesmus obliquus CPCC 157 biofilm serving as the inner light source and enhanced the biofilm growth by 19.79%. Genin et al proposed five different waveguide designs characterized by various tapper angles or notched surfaces to improve the light delivery within the microalgae biofilm, and the biofilm productivity reached 2.9 g m –2 d –1 . However, optical fibers, the technological maturity light-guiding materials which have been successfully applied in aqua-suspended microalgae PBRs and photosynthetic bacteria biofilm PBRs, − have been scarcely adopted in biofilm-based microalgae PBRs.…”