Extraction of hydrocarbons from microalga Botryococcus braunii with switchable solvents

Lipid extraction is a critical step in the development of biofuels from microalgae. Here a new procedure was proposed to extract hydrocarbons from dried and water-suspended samples of the microalga Botryococcus braunii by using switchable-polarity solvents (SPS) based on 1,8-diazabicyclo-[5.4.0]-undec-7-ene (DBU) and an alcohol. The high affinity of the non-ionic form of DBU/alcohol SPS towards non-polar compounds was exploited to extract hydrocarbons from algae, while the ionic character of the DBU-alkyl carbonate form, obtained by the addition of CO(2), was used to recover hydrocarbons from the SPS. DBU/octanol and DBU/ethanol SPS were tested for the extraction efficiency of lipids from freeze-dried B. braunii samples and compared with n-hexane and chloroform/methanol. The DBU/octanol system was further evaluated for the extraction of hydrocarbons directly from algal culture samples. DBU/octanol exhibited the highest yields of extracted hydrocarbons from both freeze-dried and liquid algal samples (16% and 8.2% respectively against 7.8% and 5.6% with n-hexane).