Novosibirsk State Technical University (NETI) has launched a project dedicated to studying the problem of fish nutrition when breeding them in artificial conditions. Research will help to understand what changes occur in the intestines of fish during the transition from one type of food to another, and in the future to develop the optimal type of nutrition for fish farming.
To preserve the health of fish during the transition from one type of diet to another is the task set by NSTU-NETI scientists. When fry are transferred from live feed to economically advantageous compound feed, various kinds of inflammatory intestinal diseases are often observed in fish. To avoid this, scientists at Novosibirsk State University began to study the mechanisms and causes of such changes.
According to Yulia Makusheva, the project leader and a junior researcher at the Bioengineering Youth Integration Laboratory, it is assumed that one of the causes of inflammation is a change in the intestinal microbiota. "In our work, we create a research model using fish of the Danio rerio species. We will look at how different bacteria from healthy and sick sturgeons affect the development of inflammation," said Yulia Makusheva.
For research, NSTU-NETI scientists plan to obtain bacteria from healthy and sick sturgeons of local fish farms and record how microscopic organisms affect the development of inflammation in representatives of Danio rerio — this species of freshwater ray-finned fish of the Cyprinid family is widely used in research work.
"We plan to develop a model system based on antimicrobial fish of the Danio rerio species, which will be populated with the normal and pathological microbiota of juvenile sturgeon fish. The use of this system will make it possible to find out the causes of intestinal dysbiosis, in particular sturgeon tympania, and to select treatment methods," said the project manager.
The results of the project will also help to develop effective preventive and therapeutic drugs against opportunistic and putrefactive intestinal microflora not only of sturgeon, but also of other species of commercial fish.
The project of fundamental and scientific research of NSTU-NETI to study the intestinal microbiota of sturgeons for the development of inflammatory bowel diseases based on the model of antimicrobial fish Danio rerio has received the support of the Russian Science Foundation.