The transition toward a circular economy requires innovative and sustainable technologies to recover valuable resources from waste streams. Microalgae have emerged as highly promising biotechnological platforms due to their ability to selectively uptake, accumulate, and transform a wide range of inorganic and organic compounds.

Beyond conventional nutrient recovery, recent research highlights the potential of microalgae in recovering critical raw materials, including rare earth elements (REEs), strategic metals (e.g., Li, Co, Ni), and phosphorus from diverse matrices such as industrial wastewater, mining residues, and battery recycling streams. Their adaptability to extreme environments, coupled with advances in strain engineering and process integration, enables the development of tailored systems for selective and efficient resource recovery.

This topic aims to showcase cutting-edge developments in microalgae-driven resource recovery, with emphasis on mechanism-driven understanding, process optimisation, and pathways toward industrial implementation.

Key Topics:

• Recovery of critical metals and rare earth elements (REEs) using microalgae
• Biological recovery of phosphorus and nutrients from waste streams
• Mechanisms of biosorption, bioaccumulation, and biomineralisation
• Selectivity and competition in multi-metal and complex matrices
• Integration of microalgae with hydrometallurgical and bioleaching processes
• Process design: photobioreactors, hybrid systems, and continuous operation
• Downstream processing and recovery of accumulated resources from biomass
• Techno-economic analysis (TEA) and life cycle assessment (LCA)
• Strain development via synthetic biology, adaptive evolution, and omics

Academic Editor:

Dr. Hoang Nhat Phong Vo (hoangnhatphong.vo@mq.edu.au)
School of Natural Science, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Macquarie University, Australia

Submission Guideline

To submit your manuscript, please go to Algae and Environment journal website at (Add Submissions - Scilight Press) and follow the procedures for manuscript submission. Author Submission Guidelines can be found at: Instruction for Authors - | Algae and Environment

There is No Article Processing Charge for all submissions and accepted papers.

All manuscripts will be peer-reviewed following the established policies and procedures of the journal. The final papers will be selected for publication depending on the results of the peer-review process and the reviews of the Academic Editors and Editor-in-Chief.