Aquaculture Production Of Fish Research Articles

Sea urchin waste as a promising nutritional source for the polychaete Hediste diversicolor (OF Müller, 1776)

In aquaculture, species diversification emerges as an imperative sustainable strategy, essential for mitigating both biological and financial risks. In this context, the cultivation of sea urchins has gained prominence as an emerging trend. However, its commercial viability still faces several challenges, namely limited growth performance. Integrated multi-trophic aquaculture (IMTA) represents a potentially more profitable model by integrating extractive species to mitigate ecological impacts and promote circular economy principles. The use of polychaetes in IMTA has proven effective in recycling waste from fish aquaculture production, however, their potential should be further explored in low-trophic aquaculture solutions. This study evaluated the potential of reared sea urchin biodeposits as a nutritional feed source for the polychaete Hediste diversicolor (OF Müller, 1776). H. diversicolor juveniles were fed three diets, over 50 days: sea urchin waste (SUW), fish waste (FW) and fish feed (FF). Survival, growth, and protein and fatty acid (FA) contents were assessed. Total survival was observed in all treatments except for FW (98%). Polychaetes fed SUW and FF presented similar specific growth rates. The protein level in the polychaetes fed SUW was significantly lower, reflecting the diet's composition. The FA profile of H. diversicolor was also influenced by the respective diets. The absolute content (μg mg−1 DW) and FA profile of polychaetes were significantly different among treatments, reflecting the composition of the diets. Saturated FA (SFA) represented the dominant class in the polychaetes fed with waste diets, while in FF polychaetes polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) were the major group. Nevertheless, polychaetes fed the waste diets demonstrated the PUFA biosynthetic capacity of this species, showing a considerably higher proportion of essential long-chain FA, compared to diets. Overall, these preliminary results suggest, for the first time, the potential for recycling sea urchin biodeposits into a polychaete biomass with high commercial value, presenting a promising opportunity for low-trophic integrated aquaculture models.

Predictive modeling of marine fish production in Brunei Darussalam's aquaculture sector: A comparative analysis of machine learning and statistical techniques

The aquaculture industry has witnessed significant global growth, offering opportunities for sustainable fish production. This research delves into the application of data analytics to develop an appropriate predictive model, utilizing diverse machine learning and statistical techniques, to forecast marine fish production within Brunei Darussalam's aquaculture sector. Employing a machine learning-based algorithm, the study aims to achieve enhanced prediction accuracy, thereby providing novel insights into fish production dynamics. The primary objective of this research is to equip the industry with alternative decision-making tools, leveraging predictive modeling, to identify trends and bolster strategic planning in farm activities, ultimately optimizing marine fish aquaculture production in Brunei. The study employs various time series and machine learning techniques to generate a precise predictive model, effectively capturing the inherent seasonal and trend patterns within the time-series data. To construct the model, the research incorporates notable algorithms, including autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA), long short-term memory (LSTM), linear regression, random forest, multilayer perceptron (MLP), and Prophet, in conjunction with correlation analysis. Evaluation of the model's performance and selection of the optimal forecasting model are based on mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) and root mean squared error (RMSE) metrics, ensuring a robust analysis of time series data. Notably, this pioneering research stands as the first-ever attempt to forecast marine fish production in Brunei Darussalam, setting a benchmark unmatched by any existing baseline studies conducted in other countries. The experiment's results reveal that straightforward machine learning and statistical techniques, such as ARIMA, linear regression, and random forest, outperform deep learning methods like MLP and LSTM when forecasting univariate time series datasets.

Ria de Alvor Suitability for Aquaculture: Future Challenges

A large number of estuarine systems provide favorable conditions for aquaculture, including high nutrient content, sheltered waters, and favorable water temperatures. In this context, the main objective of this work is to identify the most suitable areas within the Ria de Alvor for bivalve and fish aquaculture production considering present and future conditions in a climate change context. A suitability index was developed based on the results of an annual simulation with the Delft3D model and the thresholds and optimal values of development of each species were analyzed. Generally, results suggest that the most suitable areas for aquaculture were located along the axis of the lagoon’s main channel, although seasonal variability was presented depending on the species. During winter and autumn, bivalves (oysters and mussels) are more susceptible to environmental conditions than fish. Conversely, spring presents the most favorable environmental conditions for the production of all species considered. Future projections indicate a general decrease in aquaculture suitability, particularly during winter for both bivalve species and during summer for Mussels, mostly due to the predicted increase in water temperature.

Maximizing Use of Pelagic Capture Fisheries for Global Protein Supply: Potential and Caveats Associated with Fish and Co-Product Conversion into Value-Add Ingredients.

Globally, capture fisheries contribute significantly to protein supply and the food security of a third of the world's population. Although capture fisheries production has not significantly increased in tonnes landed per annum during the last two decades (since 1990), it still produced a greater tonnage of protein than aquaculture in 2018. Policy in the European Union and other locations favors production of fish through aquaculture to preserve existing fish stocks and prevent extinction of species from overfishing. However, aquaculture production of fish in order to feed the growing global population would need to increase from 82 087 kT in 2018 to 129 000 kT by 2050. The Food and Agriculture Organization states that global production of aquatic animalswas178 million tonnes in 2020. Capture fisheries contributed 90 million tonnes (51%) of this. For capture fisheries to be a sustainable practice in alignment with UN sustainability goals, ocean conservation measures must be followed and processing of capture fisheries may need to adapt food-processing strategies already used extensively in the processing of dairy, meat, and soy. These are required to add value to reduced fish landings and sustain profitability.

Compilation of antiviral treatments and strategies to fight fish viruses

AbstractThe implementation of antiviral treatments and prophylaxis strategies in fish aquaculture needs to be established. The absence of commercial vaccines for most viral diseases affecting economically relevant fish species, and the total lack of treatments to fight these diseases once they have emerged in a fish farm remains one of the main bottlenecks in fish aquaculture production. However, although no antivirals are currently applied on farms, a great number of investigations have been conducted to assess the potential use of antiviral treatments against several fish viruses. Although most of these works were based on in vitro approaches, some included in vivo experiments to demonstrate the potential applicability of these treatments. This review summarizes the investigations conducted both in vitro and in vivo in the field of antiviral treatments against fish viruses. The highlighted works include those using piscine and non‐piscine proteins with antimicrobial functions, metabolites, chemical compounds (some of which are used in medicine to treat human viruses), bioactive compounds mainly isolated from plants and bacteria, and emerging DNA‐ and RNA‐based therapeutics. This information can be used for developing both specific and broad‐spectrum antiviral strategies to be further used in the aquaculture industry, and it may even provide interesting indications for biomedical research.

Systematic Mapping of Research on Farm-Level Sustainability in Finfish Aquaculture

The sustainability of future finfish aquaculture needs to be improved to meet global environmental challenges. Global fish aquaculture production has expanded significantly recently, due to the increased demand for fish for human consumption. Therefore, it is important to mitigate challenges to the sustainability of the sector, such as pollution and depletion of natural resources. In this study, we systematically mapped the scientific literature on farm-level sustainability in fish aquaculture. The concept of sustainability was considered holistically, covering its economic, environmental and social dimensions, each consisting of a range of different aspects that may contradict or reinforce each other. Literature published between January 2000 and August 2020 with the geographical focus on Europe, Northern America and Australia–New Zealand was included. The search resulted in a total of 287 hits, but after the exclusion of articles that did not match the scope, only 17 papers remained for the systematic mapping. Of these, five papers covered all three dimensions of sustainability. Economic sustainability was addressed in 10 papers, environmental sustainability in 13 papers and social sustainability in 12 papers. This systematic mapping provides an important foundation for discussions and prioritisations of future actions to increase knowledge on farm-level sustainability in finfish aquaculture.

A continuously changing selective context on microbial communities associated with fish, from egg to fork.

Fast increase of fish aquaculture production to meet consumer demands is accompanied by important ecological concerns such as disease outbreaks. Meanwhile, food waste is an important concern with fish products since they are highly perishable. Recent aquaculture and fish product microbiology, and more recently, microbiota research, paved the way to a highly integrated approach to understand complex relationships between host fish, product and their associated microbial communities at health/disease and preservation/spoilage frontiers. Microbial manipulation strategies are increasingly validated as promising tools either to replace or to complement traditional veterinary and preservation methods. In this review, we consider evolutionary forces driving fish microbiota assembly, in particular the changes in the selective context along the production chain. We summarize the current knowledge concerning factors governing assembly and dynamics of fish hosts and food microbial communities. Then, we discuss the current microbial community manipulation strategies from an evolutionary standpoint to provide a perspective on the potential for risks, conflict and opportunities. Finally, we conclude that to harness evolutionary forces in the development of sustainable microbiota manipulation applications in the fish industry, an integrated knowledge of the controlling abiotic and especially biotic factors is required.

Too important to fail? Evaluating legal adaptive capacity for increasing coastal and marine aquaculture production in EU-Finland

This article analyses the legal adaptive capacity for increasing sustainable fish aquaculture production in EU-Finland. Currently, fish aquaculture is driven by increasing global demand of fish, declining natural fisheries, food security and blue growth policies. At the same time, environmental policies such as the EU Water Framework Directive and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive set tightening legal-ecological requirements for the industry's nutrient emissions. Against this background, the success of blue growth policies related to aquaculture – and the hope of reconciling competing interests at sea – boil down to measures available for dealing with excess nutrients. In line with the mitigation hierarchy, the article establishes four alternative pathways for the fish aquaculture industry to grow without increasing its environmental nutrient footprint significantly, and evaluates the legal adaptive capacity and the legal risks attached to these pathways.

Current status of parasitic ciliates Chilodonella spp. (Phyllopharyngea: Chilodonellidae) in freshwater fish aquaculture.

Freshwater fish farming contributes to more than two-thirds of global aquaculture production. Parasitic ciliates are one of the largest causes of production loss in freshwater farmed fishes, with species from the genus Chilodonella being particularly problematic. While Chilodonella spp. include 'free-living' fauna, some species are involved in mortality events of fish, particularly in high-density aquaculture. Indeed, chilodonellosis causes major productivity losses in over 16 species of farmed freshwater fishes in more than 14 countries. Traditionally, Chilodonella species are identified based on morphological features; however, the genus comprises yet uncharacterized cryptic species, which indicates the necessity for molecular diagnostic methods. This review synthesizes current knowledge on the biology, ecology and geographic distribution of harmful Chilodonella spp. and examines pathological signs, diagnostic methods and treatments. Recent advances in molecular diagnostics and the ability to culture Chilodonella spp. invitro will enable the development of preventative management practices and sustained freshwater fish aquaculture production.

Dietary β-glucan (MacroGard®) enhances survival of first feeding turbot (Scophthalmus maximus) larvae by altering immunity, metabolism and microbiota.

Reflecting the natural biology of mass spawning fish aquaculture production of fish larvae is often hampered by high and unpredictable mortality rates. The present study aimed to enhance larval performance and immunity via the oral administration of an immunomodulator, β-glucan (MacroGard(®)) in turbot (Scophthalmus maximus). Rotifers (Brachionus plicatilis) were incubated with or without yeast β-1,3/1,6-glucan in form of MacroGard(®) at a concentration of 0.5g/L. Rotifers were fed to first feeding turbot larvae once a day. From day 13dph onwards all tanks were additionally fed untreated Artemia sp. nauplii (1naupliusml/L). Daily mortality was monitored and larvae were sampled at 11 and 24dph for expression of 30 genes, microbiota analysis, trypsin activity and size measurements. Along with the feeding of β-glucan daily mortality was significantly reduced by ca. 15% and an alteration of the larval microbiota was observed. At 11dph gene expression of trypsin and chymotrypsin was elevated in the MacroGard(®) fed fish, which resulted in heightened tryptic enzyme activity. No effect on genes encoding antioxidative proteins was observed, whilst the immune response was clearly modulated by β-glucan. At 11dph complement component c3 was elevated whilst cytokines, antimicrobial peptides, toll like receptor 3 and heat shock protein 70 were not affected. At the later time point (24dph) an anti-inflammatory effect in form of a down-regulation of hsp 70, tnf-α and il-1β was observed. We conclude that the administration of MacroGard(®) induced an immunomodulatory response and could be used as an effective measure to increase survival in rearing of turbot.

Geo-politics and freshwater fish introductions: How the Cold War shaped Europe's fish allodiversity

Activities that manipulate ecosystems to support economic activities provide major introduction pathways for non-native species. As such, substantial differences in the socioeconomic conditions between countries could influence how ecosystems are manipulated and thus impact the composition of their communities of non-native species. Here, we compared the influence of freshwater fish aquaculture production and macro-socioeconomic drivers on the freshwater fish allodiversity of Europe between 1970 and 2009. A divergence in the socio-economic conditions of Europe prevailed during much of the latter half of the 20th Century as a result of the Cold War. For example, GDP and GDP per capita were significantly higher in Western bloc countries compared to the Eastern bloc. In this 39 year period, aquaculture production in Eastern bloc countries was dominated by Asian cyprinid fish whereas in Western bloc countries it was dominated by the North American rainbow trout Oncorhynchus mykiss. Analysis of a European database on introduced fish into the wild from aquaculture revealed that in entirety, there were 279 separate freshwater fish introductions in Europe associated with aquaculture (Eastern bloc 118, Western bloc 161), involving 117 species from 32 families. There was relatively low homogeneity in these introduced fishes between the two blocs; only 28 species were introduced into both. Western bloc countries also had significantly more introduced fishes and more introduction events, and less similarity in the introduced fishes between their countries. Aquaculture production was a significant predictor of the number of non-native freshwater fish across all the countries, although additional factors, especially human population size and GDP per capita, were also significant predictors. Thus, aquaculture has been a strong introduction pressure in Europe and provides a reliable predictor of fish allodiversity.

PROTEOMICS in aquaculture: Applications and trends

Over the last forty years global aquaculture presented a growth rate of 6.9% per annum with an amazing production of 52.5 million tonnes in 2008, and a contribution of 43% of aquatic animal food for human consumption. In order to meet the world's health requirements of fish protein, a continuous growth in production is still expected for decades to come. Aquaculture is, though, a very competitive market, and a global awareness regarding the use of scientific knowledge and emerging technologies to obtain a better farmed organism through a sustainable production has enhanced the importance of proteomics in seafood biology research. Proteomics, as a powerful comparative tool, has therefore been increasingly used over the last decade to address different questions in aquaculture, regarding welfare, nutrition, health, quality, and safety. In this paper we will give an overview of these biological questions and the role of proteomics in their investigation, outlining the advantages, disadvantages and future challenges. A brief description of the proteomics technical approaches will be presented. Special focus will be on the latest trends related to the aquaculture production of fish with defined nutritional, health or quality properties for functional foods and the integration of proteomics techniques in addressing this challenging issue.

Opportunities and Challenges to Sustainability in Aquaponic Systems

Aquaponics combines the hydroponic production of plants and the aquaculture production of fish into a sustainable agriculture system that uses natural biological cycles to supply nitrogen and minimizes the use of nonrenewable resources, thus providing economic benefits that can increase over time. Several production systems and media exist for producing hydroponic crops (bench bed, nutrient film technique, floating raft, rockwool, perlite, and pine bark). Critical management requirements (water quality maintenance and biofilter nitrification) for aquaculture need to be integrated with the hydroponics to successfully manage intensive aquaponic systems. These systems will be discussed with emphasis on improving sustainability through management and integration of the living components [plants and nitrifying bacteria (Nitrosomonas spp. and Nitrobacter spp.)] and the biofilter system. Sustainable opportunities include biological nitrogen production rates of 80 to 90 g·m−3 per day nitrate nitrogen from trickling biofilters and plant uptake of aquaculture wastewater. This uptake results in improved water and nutrient use efficiency and conservation. Challenges to sustainability center around balancing the aquaponic system environment for the optimum growth of three organisms, maximizing production outputs and minimizing effluent discharges to the environment.