ABSTRACT
Historically, seaweeds have been cultivated mainly for nutrition and consumption purposes in the Asian countries. However, an ever increasing global population combined with the discovery of valuable biochemical content within certain species of algae has expedited the development of the macroalgal aquaculture industry, which stood at a value U.S.$5.6 billion in 2014 (FAO 2014). Protein pigments present within certain marine macro- and microalgal species are ubiquitous to marine plants and have proven to be useful in modern applications. Extraction of these pigments can prove challenging; therefore, the objective of this chapter is to describe the basic extraction methods of phycoerythrin and phycocyanin pigments from Rhodophyta and Cyanobacteria and how to measure the yield, concentration, and purity. In addition, some commonly applied purification protocols are detailed.
Keywords: Phycoerythrin, phycocyanin, extraction, seaweeds, protein, pigment
