Table 3.

Examples of genetic engineering methods in microalgae and the results obtained. An extended version of this table can be found on the Supplementary Materials (Table S3).

Species	Method	Target	Improvement	References
Chlamydomonas reinhardtii	Heterologous overexpression of phytoene synthase (PSY)	Carotenoid content	2.0- and 2.2-fold higher in violaxanthin and lutein content	[161]
Chlamydomonas reinhardtii	Overexpression of acetyl-CoA synthetase (ACS)	Lipid content	2.4-fold more TAG in N depletion media	[157]
Chlamydomonas reinhardtii	Overexpression of type-2 diacylglycerol acyl-CoA acyltransferase (DGTT4)	Lipid content	2.5-fold increased TAG content in P depletion media	[156]
Chlorella vulgaris	Heterologous overexpression of mGFP	Lipid content	46% (w/w) higher lipid accumulation	[162]
Haematococcus pluvialis	Overexpression of phytoene desaturase (PDS) gene	Carotenoid content	67% increase in astaxanthin accumulation	[163]
Nannochloropsis oceanica	Knockout of NO06G03670	Lipid content	Increase in neutral lipids content by 40%	[158]
Nannochloropsis oceanica	Overexpression of RuBisCO activase	Growth productivity	Growth rate and photosynthesis increase by 32 and 28%, respectively, induced under low level of CO2	[164]
Nannochloropsis oceanica	Overexpression of type 2 diacylglycerol acyltransferase (DGAT)	Lipid content	69% increase in neutral lipid content	[154]
Phaeodactylum tricornutum	Overexpression of glycerol-3-phosphate acyltransferase 2 (GPAT2)	Lipid content	2.9-fold increase in TAG content	[155]
Phaeodactylum tricornutum	Overexpression of malic enzyme	Lipid content	2.5-fold increase in total lipid content	[159]
Phaeodactylum tricornutum	Overexpression of type 2 DGAT	Lipid content	76% increase in EPA content	[153]