SBIR Phase II: Microbial Enhancement of Soybeans for Salmonid Diets

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project aims to develop a process for enhancing the nutritional value of soybeans to replace fishmeal as the primary ingredient in farmed trout and salmon feed. Fishmeal creates environmental and economic constraints for the aquaculture industry. Plant-derived proteins are a good alternate feed source, but do not meet the nutritional requirements of many farmed fish species including trout and salmon. Prior Phase I work demonstrated that a combination of a selected fungal strain with innovations in solid substrate culture (SSC) would increase the protein content, eliminate the non-digestible carbohydrates and reduce anti-nutritional factors in soybeans. This Phase II project will test pilot-scale SSC technology to determine engineering design and economics for a commercial process to manufacture the bio-enhanced soy protein, and to demonstrate the feed value of this protein in trout feeding trials. The commercial application of this project will be in the aquaculture industry. The use of fishmeal creates economic, market and water pollution issues for fish farmers, and consumer concerns regarding environmental impacts (for example, there are reports of PCBs, dioxins, and other pesticides detected at higher levels in farmed salmon that have been fed fishmeal based diets). Replacing fishmeal with plant based proteins will promote health through increased fish consumption and will alleviate environmental and economic constraints facing the aquaculture industry.