Photosynthetic characteristics of planktonic blue-green algae: The response of twenty strains grown under high and low light

The relationship between photosynthetic rate and irradiance was measured for 20 strains of blue-green algae from the genera Anabaena, Aphanizomenon and Oscillatoria. Cells were grown at 20°C under 6:18 light-dark at 30 or 150 µE m-2 s-1. Under high light the mean light saturated rate of photosynthesis (P max) of the Oscillatoria cultures was 14·8 mg O2 mg Chl a -1 h-1, but under low light this was depressed by 42%. Anabaena and Aphanizomenon...