Cyanobacteria are the first organisms known to have produced oxygen 3.5 billion years ago and are versatile organisms with potential applications in biotechnology as feed, food, fuel, fine chemicals, and fertilizer. Cyanobacteria are ubiquitous in marine environments and play essential roles. Marine cyanobacteria and microalgae are advantageous, as they do not compete with freshwater or land and can grow in seawater and wastewaters. Indian tropical subcontinent is one of the marine 'hotspots' with a vast coastal line @4670 miles inclusive of main peninsular land and Andaman Nicobar and Laccadive Islands. This oxygenic prokaryotic organism bridges the gap between the bacteria and plants, exhibiting versatile potentials of both kingdoms.
This innate ability of the organisms has been explored by the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology, Govt. of India, resulting in the establishment of the National Facility for Marine Cyanobacteria (NFMC) at Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli, under the leadership of Dr. G. Subramanian in the year 1991. Due to many credentials, from the year 2015 the facility has been upgraded to National Repository for Marine Microalgae and Cyanobacteria by the Department of Biotechnology, Govt. of India. Now, the germplasm houses, @600 microalgae and cyanobacterial strains representing mesophilic, thermophilic, psychrophilic, and hypersaline Indian isolates including Hong Kong and Arctic and Antarctic regions. It is one among the seven centers in the World that holds Arctic and Antarctic psychrophilic strains collected by Dr.D.Prabaharan , during his Arctic and Antarctic polar expeditions under the patronage of NCAOR, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Govt. of India.