4353 Environmently-friendly technology for collagen production from freshwater fish by-products

The main research and development work in the project includes: 1) technological research for development of technique for high-yield extraction of collagen from freshwater fish by-products using environmental-friendly regents, 2) technological research f or development of technique for purification of freshwater fish collagen to obtain highly homogenous product, 3) adaptation of the findings of technological research for semi-industrial and industrial scale, 4) drawing out technological recommendation for collection, sorting, and storage of freshwater fish by-products for collagen production. Available industrial technologies based on similar principles are suited for marine raw materials and designed for large scale processing units which makes them hard ly applicable for big freshwater fish processing sites and economically unsuitable for freshwater aquaculture with its middle- and small-scale processing sites. Moreover, existing technologies in most cases imply utilisation of environmentally hazardous c hemicals. Thus, there is no directly competing technology on the market presently. At the same time, the proposed technology matches demand of freshwater aquaculture industry for new ways to improve its economic sustainability via development of new value -added products and better utilisation of resources. In this circumstances project partners are planning to exploit the results of the development through license agreements with freshwater aquaculture industry.