Biorefinery of Dunaliella salina: Sustainable recovery of carotenoids, polar lipids and glycerol.

• Development of a sustainable process to maximise the potential of Dunaliella salina. • Recovery and fractionation of large diversity of compounds from Dunaliella salina. • Integrated approach involving REACH solvents and organic solvent nanofiltration. • Recovery of 94% of polar lipids, 85% of carotenoids and 86% of glycerol. • Economic evaluation provided an appealing ROI of 440% and an IRR of 53% Dunaliella salina is well-known for its high content in carotenoids and glycerol. Nevertheless, Dunaliella salina has also a high content in lipids, including polar lipids, which are suitable for nutraceutical/cosmeceutical applications. This work proposes a sustainable process to maximise the potential of Dunaliella salina for the production of distinct fractions of carotenoids, glycerol, polar lipids and proteins, which may contribute to improve the revenues of the microalgae industry. In this work, extraction with non-hazardous solvents and organic solvent nanofiltration are integrated, in order to obtain added-value products and glycerol. Also, aiming to separate carotenoids from glycerides, a saponification process is proposed. High overall recoveries were obtained for carotenoids (85%), glycerol (86%), polar lipids (94%) and proteins (95%). In order to evaluate the profitability of the proposed biorefinery, an economic assessment was accomplished. Both CAPEX and OPEX (Capital and Operating expenditure) were calculated, likewise the Return of Investment (ROI). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]