The in-house collection effort was focused on collecting strains from inland saline habitats, particularly in Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. The reasoning behind collecting strains from these habitats was that the strains would be adapted to at least some of the environmental conditions in mass culture facilities in the southwestern United States (i. e., high light intensity and high temperatures). They would also be well suited for growth in the saline waters available for use in such facilities. In addition, many of the aquatic habitats in this region are shallow, and therefore subject to large variations in temperature and salinity; thus, the strains collected in this region might be expected to better withstand the fluctuations that would occur in a commercial production pond. Cyanobacteria, chrysophytes, and diatoms often dominate inland saline habitats. The latter were of particular interest to the program because of their propensity to accumulate lipids. There had never been a large-scale effort to collect strains with this combination of characteristics; therefore, they were not available from culture collections.

The stated objectives of the SERI culture collection and screening effort were to:

• Assemble and maintain a set of viable mono-specific algal cultures stored under conditions best suited to the maintenance of their original physiological and biochemical characteristics.

• Develop storage techniques that will help maintain the genetic variability and physiological adaptability of the species.

• Collect single species cultures of microalgae from the arid regions of Colorado,

Utah, and New Mexico for product and performance screening.

• Develop media which are suitable for their growth.

• Evaluate each species for its temperature and salinity tolerances, and quantify growth rates and proximate chemical composition for each species over the range of tolerated conditions.

Each objective was met during the course of research within the ASP. The following pages describe in detail the major findings of the work conducted by SERI researchers.