Diatoms are unicellular photosynthetic microalgae existing ubiquitously in marine and freshwater environments. This review focuses on high-value compounds produced from diatoms, including chrysolaminarin (Chrl), eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), and fucoxanthin (Fx), which can be applied in aquaculture, human health foods, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. In addition, this review provides an overview of their biosynthesis in diatoms and technologies for production. EPA and Fx typically accumulate synergistically in diatoms, while Chrl competes with EPA and Fx for carbon precursors. Several diatom strains have been employed that simultaneously accumulate these three compounds, but limitations and challenges still exist during commercialization. To address the bottleneck in biomass and high-value compound production, the optimization of cultivation parameters, the trophic mode, elicitor- or bacteria-assisted stimulations, and genetic modifications via mutant breeding, adaptive evolution engineering, and metabolic engineering have been developed in diatoms to establish improved technologies. Currently, large-scale cultivation of diatoms occurs mostly in open ponds and photobioreactors in autotrophic mode. Mixotrophic cultivation and coextraction approaches for multiple products represent novel strategies for economically enhancing the future production of biomass and high-value compounds on an industrial scale.

硅藻是在海洋和淡水环境中普遍存在的单细胞光合微藻。这篇综述重点关注由硅藻产生的高价值化合物，包括chrysolaminarin（Chrl），二十碳五烯酸（EPA）和fucoxanthin（Fx），它们可用于水产养殖，人类健康食品，药品和化妆品。此外，本文还概述了它们在硅藻中的生物合成和生产技术。EPA和Fx通常在硅藻中协同积累，而Chrl与EPA和Fx竞争碳前体。已经使用了几种硅藻菌株同时积累了这三种化合物，但是在商业化过程中仍然存在局限和挑战。为了解决生物质和高价值化合物生产的瓶颈，通过在硅藻上开发了栽培参数，营养模式，激发子或细菌辅助刺激以及通过突变育种，适应性进化工程和代谢工程进行的遗传修饰，以建立改进的技术。目前，硅藻的大规模种植大多发生在开放池塘和自养模式的光生物反应器中。多种产品的混合营养培养和共提取方法代表了一种新的策略，可在工业规模上经济地提高生物质和高价值化合物的未来产量。硅藻的大规模种植主要发生在开放池塘和自养模式的光生物反应器中。多种产品的混合营养培养和共提取方法代表了一种新的策略，可在工业规模上经济地提高生物质和高价值化合物的未来产量。硅藻的大规模种植主要发生在开放池塘和自养模式的光生物反应器中。多种产品的混合营养培养和共提取方法代表了一种新的策略，可在工业规模上经济地提高生物质和高价值化合物的未来产量。