MATHEMATICAL MODEL DEPENDENCE OPTICAL DENSITY FROM MICROALGAE BIOMASS
The applicability of the Beer-Lambert-Bouguer equation in determination microalgal biomass by culture optical density is discussed. Analysis of published data showed that due to the high heterogeneity of microalgae culture, as well as microalgae culture of high density, there is considerable deviation from a linear equation between optical density and microalgae biomass. A mathematical model describing the dependence of optical density from microalgae biomass is proposed. The model is based on the assumption that each cell absorbs the same amount of light energy, is not changed in size and has a fixed surface area. It is shown that experimental dependences of transmittance from the microalgae biomass can be described by the obtained equation with high accuracy (R2 = 0.99). Unlike the equations of the Beer-Lambert-Bouguer, the optical density from microalgae biomass is nonlinear.