Amino Acids in Prospective Feeds for Fish Aquaculture: a Review of Experimental Data

Abstract

Total dependence of aquaculture on imports of feeds can significantly compromise Russia’s food supply security; hence the task of designing new domestic feeds is of primary importance. A major challenge of world aquaculture is providing fish with a balanced diet, in particular, with a well-balanced composition of amino acids. In this review, we analyze international publications on the composition of amino acids in fish feed over the last two years. We summarize the data on the amino acid composition of prospective food sources for fish aquaculture: agricultural crops, insects, annelids, higher crustaceans, animal waste, phytoplankton, zooplankton, macrophytes, and microorganisms. We performed a comparative analysis of the composition of amino acids in promising aquafeed sources and fish flour traditionally used for fish feeding. Based on the results, we conclude that each of the examined food sources can be used as a component of fish nutrition and offers realistic prospects for production of alternative feeds. To ensure high quality of fish aquaculture products, the priority should be given to development of technologies which allow to control amino acid feed composition during the production process with respect to fish species-specific needs. It is hoped that this review will be useful to researchers and practitioners involved in designing and producing new domestic aquafeed for fish