The potential of microalgae as a biomass feedstock for biofuels, bioproducts and as a technological solution for CO2 fixation is subject to intense academic and industrial researches. However, current microalgal mass culture technologies have failed to produce bulk volume of microalgal biomass at low cost, because the contaminations of biological pollutants become a big constraint in mass cultivation and impede the industrial process. Here the transmission routes, contamination mechanisms of biological pollutants both in open ponds and photobioreactors are described and recent attempts to overcome the barrier are reviewed. What worth noting, unlike conventional microbial fermentation which uses a pure monoculture, the cultivation of microalgae is a complicated symbiotic system of microalgae-bacterial-zooplankton where the target microalgae dominate, cross infection or contamination by biological pollutants is inevitable and it will require much further research. Further investigation and development of control methods are necessary, particularly microalgal strain selection. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.