Heterologous mannitol-1-phosphate dehydrogenase gene over-expression in Parachlorella kessleri for enhanced microalgal biomass productivity

Abstract Background Microalgae have tremendous potential in CO2 sequestration, bioenergy, biofuels, wastewater treatment, and high-value metabolites production. However, large-scale production of microalgae is hampered due to photo-inhibition in outdoor cultivation. Mannitol, as an osmolyte, is known to relieve the stress produced under different abiotic stress conditions during the growth of a photosynthetic organism. Results In the present study, Mannitol-1-phosphate 5-dehydrogenase (Mt1D) was over-expressed to study the effect of mannitol over-production in Parachlorella kessleri under high-light induced stress. Over-expression of Mt1D led to 65% increased mannitol content in the transformed P. kessleri compared to that of wild type. Mannitol transformant demonstrated > 20-fold reduction in reactive oxygen species generation and 15% higher biomass productivity when grown in outdoor cultivation with high-light irradiance of 1200 μmol photons m−2 s−1. Conclusions The current study establishes that a higher mannitol concentration provides stress shielding and leads to better acclimatization of transgenic microalgae against high-light generated stress. It also led to reduced ROS generation and improved growth of microalga under study. Thus, overexpression of the Mt1D gene in microalgae can be a suitable strategy to combat high-light stress.