TEMPERATURE ACCLIMATION AND THE FATTY ACID COMPOSITION OF AN ANTARCTIC GREEN ALGA CHLORELLA

• Main Authors: Hideyuki Nagashima, Genki I. Matsumoto, Shuji Ohtani, Haruo Momse
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarctic; Antarc*
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.516.2635; http://polaris.nipr.ac.jp/~penguin/polarbiosci/issues/pdf/1995-Nagashima.pdf

Abstract: Antarctic green alga Chlorella vulgaris strain SO-26 cells cultured at 20 ° photosynthesize between 0-35OC, with a maximum rate at 20°C while cells cultured at 10 ° show a shift of the optimum to about 2 to 3OC lower and show higher activity than cells cultured at 20°C Mesophilic alga Chlorella sorokiniana strain C-133 cells cultured at 20 ° photosynthesize between 5-45C with a maximum rate at 35OC, while cells cultured at 10 ° photosynthesize between 0-40 ° with a maximum rate at 30°C in a temperature range about S ° lower than cells cultured at 20°C Strain C-133 cells cultured at 20 ° show higher photosynthetic activity than cells cultured at 10°C In both strains tested the major fatty acids are palmitic, linoleic and linolenic acids. When culture temperatures were changed from 20 to 10°C the increase of the ratio of unsaturated fatty acid to total fatty acid in strain SO-26 was considerably greater than that in strain C-133. These results indicate that in photosynthesis the properties of an Antarctic Chlorella SO-26 are more psychro-philic than those of mesophilic Chlorella C-133, and both strains can be acclimated by the culture temperature, at least partly because of fatty acid unsaturation. 1.