Abstract
Red mud is a by-product of the production of alumina from bauxite ore. However, less than 2% of red mud produced is currently utilized. Red mud contains a number of residual scarce metals including rare earth elements, some at a considerable concentration, so synchronous cultures of the red microalga Galdieria sulphuraria were tested for their ability to grow in red mud-containing medium and accumulate these rare earth elements from the mud. Red mud was added to the growth medium as an acid extract (in 10% v/v HNO3). Pigment content and photosynthetic performance are indicators of physiological condition and stress levels in microalgae. Growth of the treated culture was suppressed compared to an untreated control and the content of chlorophyll a and phycocyanin decreased while carotenoids increased substantially. Photosynthetic performance, determined as Fv/Fm, was almost unaffected by the red mud treatment. The concentration of individual rare earth elements in the red mud extract and the biomass, was determined using ICP-MS. The most accumulated rare earth elements were Ce, Nd, La, and Y (26, 15, 11 and 11 µg g−1 DM, respectively). G. sulphuraria was also cultivated under different trophic regimes, auto- and mixotrophically, with the addition of red mud extract. Growth of all cultures were comparable. The concentration of total accumulated rare earth elements was surprisingly high in mixotrophic G. sulphuraria (109 µg g−1 DM) but was tenfold lower in the autotrophic culture.
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References
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Acknowledgements
We acknowledge Mgr. Barbora Šedivá for confocal imaging, Dr. Balázs Kovács for red mud samples and prof. J. D. Brooker for critical reading and language editing of the text. We are obliged to our lifelong mentor Dr. Vilém Zachleder in memoriam, who trusted in us and in Galdieria.
Funding
This research was funded by the European fund for regional development, the program Interreg V-A Austria – Czech Republic, grant number ATCZ172 REEgain, with the institutional support RVO 61388971, the COST Action 19116 – PLANTMETALS and grant of Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports KOROLID CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/15_003/0000336. European fund for regional deveolopment,ATCZ172 REEgain,Dana Mezricky,COST,COST Action 19116,Milada Vítová,Ministerstvo Školství,Mládeže a Tělovýchovy,CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/15_003/0000336,Elisa Andresen
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Conceptualization, MV and DM; methodology, MČ, VN; validation, DM; formal analysis, MR.; investigation, VN, MČ and AS; resources, AS; data curation, MV, DM; writing—original draft preparation, VN, MČ, AS and EA; writing—review and editing, MV, EA. and DM; visualization, MV and EA; supervision, MV; project administration, MV; funding acquisition, MV, EA and DM. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
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Náhlík, V., Čížková, M., Singh, A. et al. Growth of the Red Alga Galdieria sulphuraria in Red Mud-Containing Medium and Accumulation of Rare Earth Elements. Waste Biomass Valor 14, 2179–2189 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12649-022-02021-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12649-022-02021-3