The Laboratory of Aquaculture & Artemia Reference Center (ARC) (headed by Prof. P. Bossier and Prof. P. Sorgeloos) has been involved in larviculture research since the late 70's. ARC was set up in 1978 and focused on the production and use of Artemia resources in fish and shellfish aquaculture. Since the mid 80's, research activities extended to fish & shellfish larviculture-related fields a.o. lipid and vitamin requirements, microbial management in larviculture systems, egg and larvae quality, use of enriched Brachionus and Artemia, effects of immunostimulants and other compounds on disease and stress resistance.

It has organized 4 international ‘Larvi’ symposia dealing with fish and shellfish larviculture. ARC has coordinated/participated in several international projects in the AIR, FAIR, CRAFT and INCO programs of the EC: the most recent ones Rotigen (Q5RS-2002-01302), INCO Artemia biodiversity (ICA4-CT-2001-10020) and Mud crab (ERB-IC18-CT-97-0189).

The major topics of research performed in collaboration with partners of the UGent Aquaculture R&D Center are:

• Artemia culturing biology and strain characterisation
• husbandry and nutrition of fish and crustacean broodstock
• live food production and nutritional manipulation for fish and shellfish larvae
• analysis of microbial communities
• quorum sensing (focusing on Vibrio)
• microbial bioflocs as feed in aquaculture
• gnotobiotic culture of Artemia, Brachionus and sea bass larvae gastrointestinal
• development in larvae development of alternative technique for disease prevention (probiotics, prebiotics, immunostimulants, environmental stress)
• pathology of WSSV in Penaeid shrimp
• morphological development of larvae
• transcriptome analysis in Artemia and fish larvae

Partner 1 will participate in WP1 on the standardisation of protocols MC typing. It will lead WP2 and contribute to this WP with its experience on gnotobiotic systems, quorum sensing and immunostimulants. In WP3 it will contribute with its experience on polyhydroxybutyric acid. Partner 1 is coordinating (WP5 and 6) the project in view of its ample experience.

• Tinh, N.T.N., Dierckens, K., Sorgeloos, P. and Bossier, P. (2007) A review on the functionality of probiotics in the larviculture food chain. Marine Biotechnology 10: 1-12
• Defoirdt T., Boon, N. , Sorgeloos, P., Verstraete, W. and Bossier, P. (2008) Quorum sensing and quorum quenching in Vibrio harveyi: lessons learned from in vivo work . ISME Journal 2: 19-26
• Defoirdt, T., Boon, N., Sorgeloos, P., Verstraete, W. and Bossier, P. (2007). Alternatives to antibiotics to control bacterial infections- luminescent vibriosis in aquaculture as an example. Trends in Biotechnology 25: 472-479 .
• Marques, A., Ollevier, F., Verstraete, W., Sorgeloos, P. and Bossier, P. (2006). Gnotobiotically grown aquatic animals: opportunities to investigate host-microbe interactions. Journal of Applied Microbiology 100: 903-918.

• Boon, N, De Windt, W., Verstraete, W., Top, E.M.2002 Evaluation of nested PCR-DGGE (denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis) with group-specific 16S rRNA primers for the analysis of bacterial communities from different wastewater treatment plants. FEMS Microbiology Ecology 39: 101-112