| Autor: |
Bumbac M; Faculty of Science and Arts, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania.; Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Nicolescu CM; Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Olteanu RL; Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Gherghinoiu SC; Faculty of Science and Arts, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Bumbac C; National Research and Development Institute for Industrial Ecology-ECOIND, 57-73 Drumul Podu Dambovitei, District 6, 060652 Bucharest, Romania., Tiron O; National Research and Development Institute for Industrial Ecology-ECOIND, 57-73 Drumul Podu Dambovitei, District 6, 060652 Bucharest, Romania., Manea EE; National Research and Development Institute for Industrial Ecology-ECOIND, 57-73 Drumul Podu Dambovitei, District 6, 060652 Bucharest, Romania., Radulescu C; Faculty of Science and Arts, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania.; Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Gorghiu LM; Faculty of Science and Arts, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Stanescu SG; Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Science and Technology, Valahia University of Targoviste, 13 Aleea Sinaia, 130004 Targoviste, Romania., Serban BC; IMT Bucharest, National Institute for Research and Development in Microtechnologies, 126A Erou Iancu Nicolae, 077190 Voluntari, Romania., Buiu O; IMT Bucharest, National Institute for Research and Development in Microtechnologies, 126A Erou Iancu Nicolae, 077190 Voluntari, Romania. |
| Abstrakt: |
The food industry is a high consumer of polymer packing materials, sealing materials, and engineering components used in production equipment. Biobased polymer composites used in the food industry are obtained by incorporating different biogenic materials into the structure of a base polymer matrix. Renewable resources such as microalgae, bacteria, and plants may be used as biogenic materials for this purpose. Photoautotrophic microalgae are valuable microorganisms that are able to harvest sunlight energy and capture CO 2 into biomass. They are characterized by their metabolic adaptability to environmental conditions, higher photosynthetic efficiency than terrestrial plants, and natural macromolecules and pigments. The flexibility of microalgae to grow in either low-nutrient or nutrient-rich environments (including wastewater) has led to the attention for their use in various biotechnological applications. Carbohydrates, proteins, and lipids are the main three classes of macromolecular compounds contained in microalgal biomass. The content in each of these components depends on their growth conditions. In general, proteins represent 40-70% of microalgae dry biomass, followed by carbohydrates (10-30%) and lipids (5-20%). A distinctive feature of microalgae cells is the presence of light-harvesting compounds such as photosynthetic pigments carotenoids, chlorophylls, and phycobilins, which are also receiving growing interest for applications in various industrial fields. The study comparatively reports on polymer composites obtained with biomass made of two species of green microalgae: Chlorella vulgaris and filamentous, gram-negative cyanobacterium Arthrospira . Experiments were conducted to reach an incorporation ratio of the biogenic material into the matrix in the 5-30% range, and the resulting materials were characterized by their mechanical and physicochemical properties. |
