ABSTRACT
Crude oil-based gasoline fuels have been widely used in the transportation sector since the 1920s. However, there have been great public concerns over the adverse environmental and human impact of these fuels. Hence, biomass-based bioethanol fuels have increasingly been used in blending gasoline fuels, in fuel cells, and in biochemical production in a biorefinery context. However, it is necessary to pretreat the biomass to enhance the yield of bioethanol prior to algal bioethanol production through hydrolysis of biomass and fermentation of the resulting hydrolysates, respectively. One of the most studied biomass materials for bioethanol fuels has been algal biomass as a third generation feedstock. Research in the field of algal bioethanol production has intensified in this context in the key research fronts of the pretreatment and hydrolysis of algal biomass, fermentation of algal hydrolysates, and algal bioethanol production in general. The most prolific pretreatments have been chemical, enzymatic, and to a lesser extent microbial and mechanical pretreatments. Further, macroalgae, microalgae, and to a lesser extent cyanobacteria and algae in general have been studied intensively at the expense of diatoms and dinoflagellates at the macrolevel in this context. On the other hand, on an individual level, the most prolific algae have been chlamydomonas, chlorella, chloroccum, alginates, laminaria, synechocystis, gelidium, gracilaria, nannochloropsis, saccharina, sargassum, scenedesmus, synechococcus, and ulva. However, it is essential to develop efficient incentive structures for the primary stakeholders to enhance research in this field. Although there are a number of review papers on algal bioethanol fuels, there has been no review of the 25 most-cited 25 articles in this field. Thus, this chapter presents a review of these 25 most-cited articles. Then, it discusses the key findings of these highly influential papers and comments on future research priorities in this field.
