Summer school
Microalgae Process Design: from cells to photobioreactors (6 days)
This course provides the essential skills for designing optimal microalgae-based production processes, for both research and commercial purposes.
Course Introduction
Microalgae and cyanobacteria have the potential to produce a variety of products using light as the only source of energy to fuel metabolism. Among these products are polyunsaturated fatty acids, pigments and therapeutic proteins. In addition to these high-value products, microalgae are regarded as one of the most promising resources for the production of bulk products such as food and feed lipids, food and feed proteins, base chemicals and energy sources for the industry, and on a longer term biofuels. To make economical large-scale production of such bulk products possible, the cost price for production needs to be reduced, the scale of production needs to be increased substantially and the biomass value should be maximized.
In this course “Microalgae Process Design: from cells to photobioreactors” the biology and cultivation part are covered. In a second course Microalgae Biorefinery (28-31 August, Wageningen), the next process step, i.e. the biorefinery, will be in focus. The two courses together will cover the entire microalgae process chain. When taking both courses we can offer a reduction in total course fee.
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Meet the lecturers
Other faculty
Prof. Jérémy Pruvost, University of Nantes, France
Dr Andrew Spicer, Algenuity, UK
What you will learn
This course provides the essential skills for designing optimal microalgae-based production processes, for both research and commercial purposes.
Course design
Through lectures, digital cases and a photobioreactor practical, the participants will learn: 1) how to describe microalgal metabolism quantitatively, 2) how to apply basic design principles and set up mass/energy balances for photobioreactors, 3) how to cultivate microalgae in fully controlled photobioreactors, 4) how to integrate all acquired knowledge into optimal production strategies for microalgae biomass or secondary metabolites, and 5) how to scale it up and evaluate the impact of process parameters on production costs.
Requirements
An MSc level in bioprocess technology, or alike, is recommended.