ERA-NET: Bluebio Commercial exploitation of marine collagen and chitin from marine sources

Global biological resources are limited. It is essential to fully utilise them to prevent overconsumption and necessary to utilise them to reduce waste. One possibility is to create products from what would otherwise go to landfills, be discarded, or otherwise poorly used. An estimated 138 million tons of biological waste in the EU is produced annually. This waste includes a few of the fractions the project BlueCC aims to investigate; fishery by-catches, aquaculture cleaner fish and invasive marine species. We wish to create new and innovative marine products with this as our raw material. We started by investigating what the consumers wanted through questionnaires developed by our market researchers. The questionnaires indicated that collagen from these resources mixed with yoghurt could be received well. Thus, we extracted collagen from cleaner fish. Collagen is a common constituent of the skin of many animals. The aim was to perform the extraction with new and more sustainable methods than previously. We have yet to be successful in implementing these new methods. However, the project has been successful in reducing the number of traditional chemicals used. For our finishing workshop in Brussels in September 2023 our scientists had successfully created a prototype collagen-containing product from lump fish hydrolysate mixed with yoghurt. The concept still needs some tweaking of taste. BlueCC also worked extensively with chitin (which exists in shells of crustaceans) from invading crab species. We explored the ability of chitin to induce flocculation, meaning particles flocking together in liquid.

BlueCC has: -delivered guidelines for future product development. -established a new fermentation process for chitin substrates derived from marine invasive species based on the characterized chi5 strain and uncharacterized strains. -demonstrated scalable reproducible isolation and processing methods for collagen derived products from low value biomasses and created prototype product concepts -delivered added value by reporting important bioactivities such as anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial and anti-oxidant effects. -develop a commercialisation plan, including identifying sources of financing, for the exploitation of the innovation post-project and identification of potential exploitation partners outside of the consortium.

Over the coming decades, the world will witness increased competition for limited and finite natural resources. Bio-waste is estimated at up to 138 million tons per year in the EU, of which up to 40% goes to landfill. This includes large amounts of by-catches from the fisheries. Other sources of poorly utilized marine biomass are cleaner fish used in aquaculture, and several invasive marine species which are currently causing devastation to local ecosystems. This represents not only problems, but also opportunities for innovative actions in the EU to better develop targeted uses of what is currently wasted or disturbing our ecosystems. The BlueCC project aims to take underutilised species such as invasive marine species, by-catch and cleaner fish from the aquaculture industry to develop new eco-friendly marine ingredients and products in a market acceptance approach. The focus will be on sustainably exploiting chitin and collagen produced by invasive crabs, jellyfish, starfish and cleaner fish, respectively, and demonstrate prototype products containing these polymers and/or their hydrolysates. To succeed with product development of research-intense products such as chitin/chitosan and collagen, we will apply a strong emphasis on market needs and insights throughout the project. BlueCC will be carried out by an interdisciplinary team and is divided into six main work packages addressing market driven concept development, sustainable chitin/chitosan and collagen demonstrators, characterization of the novel marine ingredients, including in vitro documentation of e.g. anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial effects, and finally, commercialization feasibility in an RRI framework. Altogether, BlueCC will in a sustainable and efficient manner exploit underutilized marine raw materials, from laboratory to prototype demonstration, to reach collagen- and chitin/chitosan-based bioactive demonstrators with potential commercial uses reaching the Technology Readiness Level 7.