Arthrospira

The crystal structure of the OCP from Arthrospira maxima has been solved to 2.1 A resolution (Kerfeld et al. 2003). It is composed of two domains and the carotenoid, 3 -hydroxyechinenone, spans both. The carotenoid is almost completely buried within the protein only 3.4% of the pigment surface is accessible to solvent (see Figure 1.3a). The OCP is a dimer in solution the intermolecular interactions are largely mediated by hydrogen bonding among the N-terminal 30 amino acids, as shown in Figure 1.3b... 

Knutson, R. (1998). The red carotenoid protein from Arthrospira maxima. MS thesis, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN. 

Polfvka, T., C. A. Kerfeld, T. Pascher, and V. Sundstrom (2005). Spectroscopic properties of the carotenoid 3 -hydroxyechinenone in the orange carotenoid protein from the cyanobacterium Arthrospira maxima. Biochemistry 44(10) 3994—4003. 

Vonshak A. (1997) Spirulina platensis (Arthrospira) Physiology, Cell-biology and Biotechnology. Taylor Francis, London. 

Cyanobacteria can be fairly cultured under laboratory conditions, ranging from small batch cultures to high-volume bioreactors (Marxen et al, 2005 Richmond et al, 1993), but they can also be grown outdoors, in tubular bioreactors or large ponds. For example, the nontoxic species Arthrospira platensis (also known as Spirulina) has been cultured in... 

Sawaya MR, Krogmann DW, Serag A et al. Structures of cytochrome c-549 and cytochrome c6 from the cyanobacterium Arthrospira maxima. Biochemistry 2001 40 9215-9225. 

Cultures of ChloreUa sorokiniana, Chlorella zofingiensis, Chlorococcum sp., Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (Chlorophyta), Arthrospira platensis (Cyanobacteria), Monodus subterraneus... 

Mijhling, M. (2000) Characterization of Arthrospira (Spirulina) strains. PhD thesis, University of Durham, UK. 

Hu, Q. 2004. Industrial production of microalgal cell-mass and secondary products—major industrial species Arthrospira (Spirulina) platensis. In Handbook of Microalgal Culture Biotechnology and Applied Phycology (A. Richmond, ed.), pp. 264-272. Blackwell PubUshing, Oxford. 

Microalgae have been used in various foods because of their ubiquitous availability in oceans and also due to their tremendous medicinal values. Earlier, as many as 206 strains of 152 marine microalgal species with UVA- and UVB-absorbing compounds were identified (Jeffrey et ah, 1999). Arthrospira platensis or Spirulina platensis (commonly called as nutraceutical spirulina) is a blue-green microalgae with a long history as a food source in East Africa and precolonial Mexico (Wikipedia). 

Noguchi, Y., Ishii, A., Matsushima, A., Haishi, D., Yasumuro, K.-i., Moriguchi, T., Wada, T., Kodera, Y., Hiroto, M., Nishimura, H., Sekine, M., and Inada, Y. (1999). Isolation of biopterin-a-glucoside from Syirulina (Arthrospira) ylatensis and its physiologic function. 

Arthrospira, Chlorella, and D. salina were used in human nutrition diets because of their high protein content and their excellent nutritive value. In addition, this microalga has various possible health-promoting effects the alleviation of hyperlipidemia, suppression of hypertension, protection against renal failure, growth promotion of intestinal Lactobacillus, and suppression of elevated serum glucose level. A significant amount of... 

Arthrospira production is realized in China and India (Kato and Suzuki, 1971 Morris et ah, 2007). Therefore, new interest has been developed to search natural and safe bioactive peptides from natural sources. Furthermore, antioxidant peptides have been isolated from hydrolysates of various proteinaceous food materials and recently the possible roles of food-derived bioactive peptides in reducing the risk of diseases have been reported (Kim and Wijesekara, 2010). In addition, two peptides were identified from the enzyme hydrolysis of N. incerta. Table 25.2 shows some microalgae-derived peptides. 

Microalgae were studied as a potent source for food additive, nutraceuti-cal, or pharmaceuticals. In fact, 30% of the current world algal production is used for animal feed where over 50% of the current world production of Arthrospira is used as feed supplement. It also needs to be of the correct size and shape to be ingested and to have high nutritional qualities and a digestible cell wall to make nutrients available. Protein content is a major factor determining the nutritional value of microalgae. 

Belay A, Kato T, Ota Y (1996) Spimlina Arthrospira) potential application as an animal feed supplement. J Appl Phycol 8 303-311... 

Table 2 Comparison Between Experimental Biomass Volumetric Growth Rates Obtained in Different Kinds of Photobioreactors Cultivating Arthrospira platensis and the Knowledge Model Presented in this Chapter—cont d... 

Cogne G, Lehmann B, Dussap CG, Gros JB Uptake of macro minerals and trace elements by the cyanobacterium Spirulina platensis (Arthrospira platensis PCC 8005) under photo-autotrophic conditions culture medium optimization, Biotechnol Bioeng 81(5) 588-593,... 

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