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Detailed Selling Lead Description
Subject: Innovation Award finalists: Planktonic
Message:
Planktonic supplies technology that we know mainly from science fiction: They
cryopreserve living animal plankton and let the fish farmers revive the plankton
when the fish is to be fed. For the researchers behind the technology, this work
has been long and complicated – but for the fish farmer it is quick and simple to
use.
Just how Planktonic manages to capture large amounts of living animal
plankton, cryopreserve the plankton, store, transport and then revive it, is a
well-guarded secret. But it is beyond doubt that they have succeeded, and on
an industrial scale.
A big problem in farming of marine species
Planktonic has a good reason to keep their cards close to the chest. The
believe they have found the answer to one of the greatest problems in marine
fish farming: Without live feed rich in essential marine fatty acids, mortality is
too high and growth rates too low in relation to the potential that the fish has.
Cryopreservation
Planktonic has for over a decade worked on the technology and methods that
allow them to harvest, store and transport live animal plankton directly to the
fish farmer. The use, i.a., cryopreservation technology. Cryopreservation is a
way in which you can freeze living organisms without damaging or killing the
organism, and then later revive it.
Artemia
The problem about marine aquaculture today is that artemia, which is the
species that fish farmers use as live feed, originates in salt inland lakes – not in
the ocean. This plankton must be hatched and cultivated in tanks on the fish
farming premises, where they are fed large amounts of algae. The juvenile fish
then eat the artemia and in this way get the nutrition from the algae. To spend
time growing the fish feed requires a lot of time and money for the fish farmers.
In addition, it is well known that artemia is a source of many un-wanted bacteria
and viruses in the tanks where they are being cultivated.
Revolutionary development
Another problem with artemia is that this plankton is low on the important
marine fatty acids, which make the fish grow fast, and has a good health.
“There is a lot of evolution in aquaculture, - a constant flow of incremental
improvements” says CEO of Planktonic, Mr. Rune Husby. “But this, on the other
hand, is a revolution. To deliver live feed, rich in marine fatty acids, directly from
the sea in a way that is simple to use for the fish farmer, changes all the
premises for those who want to farm species like cod, halibut, shrimp and other
marine species.” At the Government Conference on Future Aquaculture, Prime
Minister Erna Solberg mentioned Planktonic as an example of a company that
can contribute to developing aquaculture of species which over time may
become as big as salmon.
More to read...(see Planktonic message)
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