WP4 - Innovative aspects for sustainable aquaculture

The WP4 - Innovative aspects for sustainable aquaculture, project has been involved in planning and managing the activities of sustainable aquaculture through different topics addressed by 16 research teams well integrated with each other. Within this context, the criteria for selecting the Allocated Zone for Aquaculture (AZA) for the aquaculture activities and the spatial limits for acceptability of environmental effects (AZE) were defined, thereby encouraging fish farmers in the processes of site selection and identification of benchmarks.

In order to identify the priority pollutants and potentially pathogenic bacterial species, surveys were performed in several fish farms. Moreover, polyculture systems with different trophic levels species and with fouling bio controllers organisms have been developed. The bioremediation has involved the use of porifera Hymeniacidon perlevis to remove or neutralize pollutants from a contaminated aquaculture site and new useful species for the extraction of bioactive compounds usable in different industrial activities.

Useful results have been obtained from reproduction tests conducted on fish species such as Pagellus bogaraveo, Scorpaena scrofa and Sardina pilchardus, and breeding of invertebrates such as Octopus vulgaris and Paracentrotus lividus. In this last case, feeds of new formulation have been used, based on terrestrial vegetables from agricultural waste. As potential biomass for new formulations of foods in the field of animal feed, the potential breeding of macroalgae Chaetomorpha linum and polychaete Sabella spallanzanii were also verified. On the diatomea Skeletonema marinoi were carried out experiments of breeding in order to increase the concentration of the carotenoids and intracellular proteins and lipids, with the aim to evaluate its use in nutraceuticals.

Special attention has been paid to the sea bass (Dicentrarchus labrax) on which researches on the use of probiotic Saccharomycetes in the diet of juveniles have been made and new commercial feeds for the breeding were tested. Moreover, researches on the physiology of the swimming were carried out, also with the aim to define new behavioural models for welfare evaluation. Finally, molecular and enzymatic analyses have defined genes and proteins involved in the hepatic detoxification.

Integrated Multi Trophic Aquaculture (IMTA)	Reproduction of new species: blackspot seabream (Pagellus bogaraveo)	Assessing welfare of farmed species