O.K. AGWA, S.N. IBE AND G.O. ABU
Abstract
The growth response of Chlorella was studied under conditions of different media (cow dung extract, synthetic and Bangladesh II) maintained at a temperature of 28 ±2oC within a retention period of 21 days. The organism was obtained by blooming to a deep green colour after 5 days in a 10:90 mixture of pond water and cow dung extract. Under natural illumination biomass yields (dry mass) were cow dung medium 1.75mg/ml, synthetic medium 1.08mg/ml and the Bangladesh medium 0.72mg/ml. Chlorella showed potential for lipid production in the cow dung medium with about 13.3%(w/w) lipids in the wet cells, the others were 6.97%(w/w) for wet cells in the synthetic medium and the Bangladesh II medium 3.0%(w/w) lipid content for wet cells. There is a potential of algal biotechnology by using an inexpensive growth medium formulation such as cow dung waste for the cultivation of this algae (Chlorella).