On Friday the 24th of February, we hosted the AquaDetector Sino-Malta Project final event in our facilities here in Malta.

We would like to thank you warmly for joining us at the final event of the Sino – Malta Collaborative project AquaDetector. Your presence and engagement in the project and our organisation is appreciated, and we hope to host you again in the future.

AquaBioTech Group would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the Malta Council For Science & Technology who have funded this project through the Sino-Malta Fund 2019 (Science and Technology Cooperation) Grant number Sino-Malta-2019-11. We additionally recognise the contribution of financial support for Chinese partners by Science and Technology Cooperation–Sino-Malta Fund 2019: Research and Demonstration of Real-time Accurate Monitoring System for Juvenile Fish in Recirculating Aquaculture System (AquaDetector, Grant No. 2019YFE0103700) , by the Ministry of Science and Technology, China

Background overview of the project

The AquaDetector project aims to develop precise detection technologies to visualise water quality distribution, classify fish stress behaviours, and analyse the combined impact of environmental factors on juvenile grouper and trout as reference fish. Histology, biochemistry, and growth will be the three main factors analysed, reflecting fish quality, animal welfare, and production respectively. The coupling correlation model developed will be integrated into a monitoring system in order to achieve smart high-precision detection in RAS.

How ABTG was involved

• Assess how stress caused by temperature, varying concentration of dissolved oxygen and CO2, and flow rate, affects the growth, biomass, feeding, oxygen consumption, and physical characteristics of juvenile trout in RAS.
• Validate CFD models of temperature, dissolved oxygen and CO2 in our facility and develop image detection technologies to visualize the water quality distribution.
• Classify fish stress behaviour using video image analysis under varying production parameters, and support the integration of data into a monitoring system to further automate RAS production.
• Disseminate the project results to European stakholders.
• Identify future collaboration between Chinese and Maltese entities to strengthen R&D activities and technology transfer

Published article for more reading >> We are Aquaculture  | SeafoodSource | The Fish Site | UndercurrentNews