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Farming of seaweeds 2015

  • September 2015
DOI:10.1016/B978-0-12-418697-2.00003-9
  • In book: Seaweed Sustainability Food and non-food applications
  • Edition: first
  • Publisher: Elsevier
  • Editors: Tiwari B and Troy D
Authors:
Ricardo Radulovich at University of Costa Rica
Ricardo Radulovich
Amir Neori at University of Haifa-Leon Charney School of Marine Sciences
Amir Neori
  • University of Haifa-Leon Charney School of Marine Sciences
Diego Valderrama at George Mason University
Diego Valderrama
CRK Reddy at Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai
CRK Reddy
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Abstract

Seaweed farming at sea is proving an increasingly competitive biomass production alternative for food and related uses. Farmed seaweed output has been growing exponentially, reaching 24 million tons by 2012. Remarkably, 99 % of this production occurred in merely eight Asian nations. Most of the remaining 150 countries and territories with coasts are yet to begin seaweed farming. With current technology and extensive available sea areas, requiring no land, freshwater or fertilizers, seaweed production can expand sustainably to the scale of agriculture, while providing a variety of valuable ecosystem services. Following a deductive or principle-based approach, that establishes seaweed primary productivity as a basis for food production, this chapter describes the fundamentals of seaweed farming, harvest and post-harvest techniques, ecological and economic considerations and a perspective on opportunities and challenges. The objective is to provide both an overall account of the state-of-the-art on seaweed farming as well as a contribution to the industry's sustainable development.
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In: B. Tiwari and D. Troy (Eds.).
Seaweed Sustainability - Food and Non-
Food Applications. Elsevier, Amsterdam.
September 2015.
Chapter 3. Farming of Seaweeds
Ricardo Radulovich
1
, Amir Neori
2
, Diego Valderrama
3
, C.R.K. Reddy
4
, Holly Cronin
5
and John Forster
6
Summary
Seaweed farming at sea is proving an increasingly competitive biomass production alternative for food
and related uses. Farmed seaweed output has been growing exponentially, reaching 24 million tons by
2012. Remarkably, 99 % of this production occurred in merely eight Asian nations. Most of the
remaining 150 countries and territories with coasts are yet to begin seaweed farming. With current
technology and extensive available sea areas, requiring no land, freshwater or fertilizers, seaweed
production can expand sustainably to the scale of agriculture, while providing a variety of valuable
ecosystem services. Following a deductive or principle-based approach, that establishes seaweed
primary productivity as a basis for food production, this chapter describes the fundamentals of seaweed
farming, harvest and post-harvest techniques, ecological and economic considerations and a perspective
on opportunities and challenges. The objective is to provide both an overall account of the state-of-the-
art on seaweed farming as well as a contribution to the industry’s sustainable development.
Key words
Agriculture, Aquaculture, Climate change, Coastal, Cultivation, Food production, Macroalgae, Nutrition,
Ocean, Off shore, Sea farming, Seaweed, Water shortage.
Sections
1. Introduction
2. Seaweed production and use in perspective
3. Primary production: the need and means to increase it
4. Seaweed farming principles
5. Seaweed cultivation techniques
6. Wild harvesting
7. Harvesting of cultivated seaweeds
8. Basic postharvest handling
9. Ecological and environmental impacts of seaweed farming
10. Economic and social considerations of seaweed farming
11. Opportunities and challenges
12. Conclusions: an idea whose time has come
1
Department of Biosystems Engineering, University of Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica.
2
Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Ltd., National Center for Mariculture, Eilat, Israel.
3
Food and Resource Economics Department, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA.
4
CSIR-Central Salt and Marine Chemicals Research Institute, Bhavnagar, Gujarat, India.
5
Dept. of Geography, McGill University, Montreal, Canada; and Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, Panama.
6
Forster Consulting Inc., Port Angeles, Washington, USA.
... A sustainable large-scale commercial use of macroalgae feedstock requires extensive macroalgae farming, or seagriculture 3 , as natural stocks are limited and wild-stock harvesting leads inevitably to over-exploitation 4 . Such large-scale farming has developed during the last 50 years in a few Asian nations in which demand has traditionally existed, but has failed to rise in most coastal countries, mainly due to low demands 5 Therefore, the necessary steps to increase the robustness of the multi-scale model and decrease the level of uncertainty are to study the dynamics of model variables and to perform high-resolution calibration of model parameters on different scales. ...
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Algae: Their World Explored
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Algal biotechnology industries and research activities in China
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In old China there were very few people engaged in the study of the algae,but in new China, freshwater and marine algae are studied by over onehundred old and new phycologists. There is now an algal biotechnologyindustry consisting of an aquaculture industry, producing large amounts ofthe seaweeds Laminaria, Porphyra, Undaria, Gracilaria,eucheumoids, and the microalgae Dunaliella and Spirulina. There is also a phycocolloid industry, producing algin, agar andcarrageenan; an industry producing chemicals and drugs, such as iodine,mannitol, phycocyanin, β-carotene, PSS (propylene glycol alginatesulfate) and FPS (fucose-containing sulfated polysaccharides) and anindustry producing food, feed and fertilizer. The Laminariacultivation industry produces about 900,000 t dry Laminaria,probably the largest producer in the world and 13,000 t algin,undoubtedly one of the largest algin producer in the world.
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Marine Algae and Polysaccharides with Therapeutic Applications
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ncludes bibliographical references and index.. Contents: Marine fisheries by-products as potential nutraceuticals: an overview / Se-Kwon Kim, Eresha Mendis, and Fereidoon Shahidi -- Omega-3 oils: sources, applications, and health effects / Fereidoon Shahidi -- Omega-3s and their impact on brain health / Genevieve Young and Julie Conquer -- Omega-3 fatty acids in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases through anti-inflammation and neuroprotection: a review of studies in animal models / Cai Song -- Microencapsulation of marine lipids as a vehicle for functional food delivery / Yulai Jin ... [et al.] -- Chitin and chitosan / Rosalee S. Rasmussen and Michael T. Morrissey -- Production of bioactive chitosan oligosaccharides and their potential use as nutraceuticals / Se-Kwon Kim, Niranjan Rajapakse, and Fereidoon Shahidi -- Glucosamine production and health benefits / Jaroslav A. Kralovec and Colin J. Barrow -- Functional and bioactive peptides from hydrolyzed aquatic food proteins / Hordur G. Kristinsson -- Marine-derived protein hydrolysates, their biological activities and potential as functional food ingredients: ace-inhibitory peptides derived from bonito / Hiroyuki Fujita and Masashi Yoshikawa -- Marine algal constituents / Yvonne V. Yuan -- Beneficial health effects of seaweed carotenoid, fucoxanthin / Kazuo Miyashita and Masashi Hosokawa -- The production and health benefits of astaxanthin / Miguel Olaizola -- Marine algae and polysaccharides with therapeutic applications / J. Helen Fitton, Mohammad R. Irhimeh, and Jane Teas -- Nutraceuticals and functional foods from marine microbes: an introduction to a diverse group of natural products isolated from marine macroalgae, microalgae, bacteria, fungi, and cyanobacteria / Adam M. Burja and Helia Radianingtyas -- Shark cartilage: potential for therapeutic application for cancer--review article / Kenji Sato ... [et al.] -- Calcium from fish bone and other marine resources / Won-Kyo Jung, Fereidoon Shahidi, and Se-Kwon Kim -- Immunoenhancing preparations of marine origin / Jaroslav A. Kralovec and Colin J. Barrow.
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Fucoxanthin is a carotenoid isolated from Sargassum siliquastrum and is considered to be one of major active compound of marine algae. In this study, we investigated and confirmed the protective effect of fucoxanthin on UV-B induced cell injury in human fibroblast via 2',7'-dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate (DCFH-DA), 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT), and comet assays. Intracellular ROS generated by exposure to UV-B radiation, which was significantly decreased by addition with various concentrations of fucoxanthin. Cell survival rate was increased with fucoxanthin pre-treated cells, which was reached around 81.47% at 100 mu M, and the inhibitory effect of cell damage exhibited dose-dependent manner. Moreover, fucoxanthin having protective properties was demonstrated via Hoechst 33342/PI staining. Hence, on the basis of the above-mentioned studies, fucoxanthin has the ability to protect against oxidative stress induced by UV-B radiation and which might be applied to antioxidant and cosmeceutical industries.
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Algal Polysaccharides
Chapter
  • Dec 1983
This chapter reviews algal polysaccharides. Fossil evidence indicates that many of the algae have changed very little in the hundreds of millions of years and it may be somewhat reckless to assume that the evolution of algal glycan structures has proceeded exactly in parallel with morphology. As new fossil evidence comes continually to light, ideas about the phylogenesis of algae are constantly being revised and there are inevitably areas of disagreement among authorities. There is unanimous agreement that the blue-green algae (Cyanophyta) are by far the oldest and there is reasonable evidence that the red algae (Rhodophyta) appeared next and the brown algae (Phaeophyta) last. In view of the very primitive morphology of algae, one might expect that the structures of the glycans would also be simple. In fact, the reverse seems to be true. Many algal glycans surpass even the gum exudates of terrestrial plants in apparent complexity. Some disorder might perhaps be expected in the glycans of organisms that are low on the evolutionary scale, because it implies that the biosynthetic enzymes are low in specificity rather than large in number. The apparent structural complexity of some algal glycans is increased by a special feature of the reproductive cycle of many algae, whereby the organism passes successively through gametophytic (haploid, male and female) and sporophytic (diploid) forms. There is growing evidence that many algal glycans exist in the native state, at least partly, as proteoglycans and that accepted procedures for isolation usually entail some degradation of these more complex macromolecules, with the liberation of the glycan moiety.
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World seaweed utilisation: An end-of-century summary
Article
  • Jan 1999
The data for worldwide seaweed production for the years 1994/1995 are summarised. At least 221 species of seaweed were used, with145 species for food and 101 species for phycocolloid production. 2,005,459 t dry weight was produced, with 90% coming from China, France, UK, Korea, Japan and Chile. 1,033,650 t dry weight was cultured with 90% coming from China, Korea and Japan. Just four genera made up 93% of the cultured seaweed: Laminaria (682,581 t dry wt), Porphyra (130,614 t dry wt), Undaria (101,708 t dry wt) and Gracilaria (50,165 t dry wt). The value of the harvest was in excess of US $ 6.2 billion. Since 1984 the production of seaweeds worldwide has grown by 119%.
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