课题组关于藻类虾青素的又一研究成果《Accumulation of astaxanthin was improved by the nonmotile cells of Haematococcus pluvialis》在Biomed Research International上发表。该研究比较了雨生红球藻两种不同类型的营养细胞（游动细胞和不动细胞）在胁迫阶段的虾青素积累情况。结果显示，在非运动细胞培养物中最高的虾青素浓度达到48.42 mg L^-1，虾青素产率最高的是5.04 mg L^-1 day^-1，显着高于游动细胞。细胞形态学观察结果显示，在胁迫过程中，游动细胞培养物中出现大量光氧化损伤细胞，从而导致相对较高的细胞死亡率（22.2％）。而不动细胞由于抗性更高，其死亡率只有9.6％。此外，在不动细胞培养物中观察到更大的红色囊肿与高水平的虾青素形成，计算结果表明，不动细胞形成的红色囊肿的平均直径和虾青素含量分别是运动细胞形成的红色囊肿的1.56倍和1.94倍。该研究证明了诱导不动细胞可以显着增加虾青素的积累，为优化现有的工业生产培养策略提供了可能。

Abstract

    The green algae Haematococcus pluvialis as currently the primary industrial source for natural astaxanthin is widely used in the aquaculture, nutraceuticals, cosmetics, food and feed industries. The aim of this study is to improve the production of astaxanthin using the nonmotile cells of H. pluvialis. The experimental design was achieved by two different types H. pluvialis cell for a 9-day induction period. The accumulation of astaxanthin was tested first, the highest astaxanthin concentration of 48.42 mg L^-1 was obtained in the nonmotile cell cultures with the highest the productivity of 5.04 mg L^-1 day^-1, which was significantly higher than that in the motile cell cultures. Secondly, the microscopic examination of cell morphological showed a large number of photooxidative damaged cells occurred in the motile cell cultures, resulting in relatively high cell mortality rate (22.2%). In contrast, a low cell mortality rate of 9.6% was obtained in nonmotile cell cultures. In addition, a lot of bigger red cysts formed with high-level astaxanthin were observed in the nonmotile cell cultures. The results showed that the average diameter and astaxanthin content of red cysts formed by non-motor cells were 1.56 and 1.94 times, respectively, of red cysts formed by motile cells. In conclusion, the works presented here suggest that inducing the synthesis of astaxanthin by H. pluvialis nonmotile cells can significantly increase the production of astaxanthin, which provided a possibility to optimize the existing culture strategy for the industrial productions.

作者：李峰、蔡明刚、林明伟、黄翔鹄、王俊、郑雪红、吴少婷、安宇

通讯作者：蔡明刚