Agricultural biostimulant development based on cultivated microalgae

• Grant number: 23/01098-6
• Support Opportunities: Research Grants - Innovative Research in Small Business - PIPE
• Duration: June 01, 2023 - February 29, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Agronomy - Crop Science
• Principal Investigator: Luiz Roberto de Olival Costa
• Grantee: Luiz Roberto de Olival Costa
• Host Company: Microalgae Biotecnologias Ltda
• CNAE: Aqüicultura em água doce
• City: São Paulo
• Pesquisadores principais: Paulo Mazzafera
• Associated researchers: Augusto Yukitaka Pessinatti Ohashi ; Eduardo Jacob Lopes
• Associated scholarship(s): 23/07880-8 - Agricultural biostimulant development based on cultivated microalgae, BP.PIPE; 23/07915-6 - Agricultural biostimulant development based on cultivated microalgae, BP.TT

Abstract

Currently, the agricultural sector faces two concurrent challenges: the increasing the food productivity of the growing global population, increasing the efficiency of resource use, and reducing the environmental impact on ecosystems and human health generated by the excessive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The use of plant biostimulants is a very helpful practice in resolving this problem. Biostimulants are products that contain organic substances that act in the regulation and modification of the physiological processes of the plants, evolving in the improvement of the capacity of absorption of nutrients, in the growth and cellular division and increasing the resistance to abiotic stresses (such as drought, salinity, extreme temperatures) and biotic (attack by pathogens and parasites) decreasing dependence on the use of fertilizers and chemical pesticides and the negative effects they have. The objective of this project is to produce and commercially validate an agricultural biostimulant based on the microalgae Scenedesmus obliquus, grown in photobioreactors. The strategy for a short-term validation, essential to make the development of the product economically viable within the company, will be carried out through a protocol of comparative analyzes between the studied biostimulant, the S. Obliquus extract and the seaweed-based biostimulant of greater tradition in the market, the extract of Ascophyllum nodosum. This protocol will cover the evaluation of antioxidant enzymatic activities, the elicitor aspect of the mechanisms of action of biostimulants - superoxide dismutase, ascorbate peroxidase and catalase, oxidative stress indicator compounds (MDA, peroxide, superoxide), enzymes and compounds of carbon metabolism (invertase, total soluble sugars, sucrose, reducing sugars) and nitrogen metabolism (total soluble amino acids, nitrate, nitrate reductase, urease, total proteins), and soluble phenolic compounds, in addition to growth and production assessment measures such accompanied by analysis of chlorophyll, carotenoids and alsophotosynthetic rate of plants using IRGA. (AU)