weight per liter of culture medium. Algal biomass was measured
after filtration through Whatman glass microfilters
and lyophilization for 24 h. It was transferred to a desiccator
before weighing. Ten-day-old harvested biomass was
analyzed in triplicate for various pigments. Chlorophyll
was extracted in N,N-dimethyl formamide and absorbance
recorded at 664 nm following the method of Inskeep and
Bloom (1985). For carotenoids, acetone extraction procedure
was followed. Phycoerythrin (PE) and phycocyanin
(PC) were extracted in 0.05 M phosphate buffer (pH 6.8)
and measured following the method of Bennett and Bogorad
(1973). Nutritive value of N. lobatus was determined as:
4 · percentage of protein + 9 · percentage of fat + 4 · percentage
of carbohydrate (Indrayan et al., 2005).