Industrial seaweed seedling production for large scale offshore cultivation process - SEABREED

The main goal of the project is to design a large scale production of seaweed seedlings that will be used for further cultivation in exposed offshore systems. To reach this goal the project will focus on the initial stages of the seaweeds life cycle and m ust obtain fundamental biological understanding of the formation of spores, gametogenesis and further attachment to substrates. This cultivation of seaweed seedlings involves a multidisciplinary approach, which involves biologist, physicist, biochemists, aquaculture engineers and production designers, in order to develop modern and cost effective production systems for seaweed. It is also a goal to cultivate the seaweed in open offshore conditions, and the seedling production must be developed for such sy stems. This means that the period of land based cultivation will be shortened as much as possible. The project will be organized in 5 work packages:1). Basic studies of the initial life stage of seaweed to develop an industrial culture, 2). Development of an industrial seeding technology, 3). Design of a seedling centre, 4). Initial breeding experiments, and 5). Economic analysis. The project will be carried out as an active collaboration between SINTEF Fisheries and aquaculture (SINTEF) and NTNU .