Not just another brick in the wall - Advancing Microalgal Biotechnology through Cell Wall Research

Climate change, energy- and food security are the main challenges of our society.

Microalgae can be part of the solution; they are highly efficient in photosynthetic carbon capture, and their biomass can be used as energy source, for value products, food or feed.

Even though microalgae are regarded as promising feedstock, costs of downstream processes are too high to compete with fossil-based products.

Extraction of valuable compounds from microalgae is a challenging bottleneck in the process because of the thick and rigid cell wall surrounding microalgae.

Still, basically, nothing is known about the diverse cell walls of green microalgae (Chlorophytes) commonly used in biotechnological applications.We will provide fundamental knowledge and understanding on the composition and the enzymes generating this cell wall in four Chlorophytes belonging to different taxa.

We will determine how cell wall polymer plasticity enables microalgae to cope with environmental stresses and elucidate how these alterations are regulated by cell wall integrity (CWI) systems mechanism.

Understanding carbon flux in microalgae will allow us to elucidate the metabolic pathway from CO2 to the cell wall and to influence the algal cell to produce valuable carbohydrates (e.g. starch, glucose) instead of cell wall polymers.

The identified key components for optimizing cell wall composition will be validated in algal strains with improved cell wall properties for future biotechnological applications.