Artemia nutrition and enrichment

Bio-encapsulation of Brine shrimp

Brine shrimp will take up almost all particulate material as long as it has the proper size range. Similarly, lipophylic compounds can be incorporated into emulsions and water-soluble components into liposomes or microcapsules and in this way enriched or “bio-encapsulated” into the Artemia.

Enrichment for nutrition

Using this bio-encapsulation technique all kinds of nutrients such as lipids, fatty acids, peptides, vitamins, pigments, … can be incorporated  into Artemia  to be fed to  the shrimp or fish larvae. The effect of this enriched life feed can then be assessed.

Enrichment for disease control

Similarly as for nutritional purposes, different prophylactic or therapeutic agents, such as probiotics, immunostimulants, vaccines, antimicrobial peptides, etc. can be uploaded in the live feed Artemia and transferred to the shrimp or fish larvae.

Components to test

Possible test products can be:

• Purified compounds
• Enrichment products (including unicellular algae and yeasts)
• Bacterial strains
• Emulsified preparations
• Micro-particulate compounds
• Self-emulsifying concentrates

Possibilities for testing

Study enrichment kinetics of your product in Artemia

In a first step, for new products, the enrichment efficiency of the product in Artemia needs to be studied. Here the proper delivery strategy (e.g. emulsion or liposomes), enrichment dose, pre-enrichment time (time between hatching and addition of enrichment diet), enrichment period and conditions are determined to obtain optimal enrichment (fatty acid content/composition) levels.

Study the effect of enriched Artemia on target species

Once optimal enrichment conditions are established, the effect of feeding these enriched Artemia on culture performance of various aquaculture species can be evaluated in a feeding trial. Apart from survival and growth various other parameters such as disease or stress resistance, effect on immuunparameters, etc. can be evaluated. Test species include penaeid shrimp, freshwater prawn, different marine and freshwater fish species.