Sparos Science and Technology

by Ana Nobre, Product Manager/Researcher, Sparos Lda

Sparos is a science and technology company that has been developing new products and nutritional solutions for the aquaculture market since 2008. Sparos has been providing contract research services to industrial customers to support the development of various feed additives, novel feed ingredients and feeds for fish and shrimp. Using the scientific knowledge of fish nutrition and expertise of new ingredients and feed additives, Sparos today also markets its nutritional tools to evaluate aquafeeds.
 

Nutritional scientific tools include trial and field results, lab analytics, data analysis methods and mathematical models for evaluating and simulating the performance of aquafeeds. The development of innovative nutritional tools is gaining momentum in aquaculture as the sector enters the age of digitalisation, gearing towards precision farming.

This technology will certainly play an important role in the sustainable growth of the aquaculture and aquafeed sectors. Indeed, as aquafeed formulation is moving sustainably towards increasingly replacing fish meal and fish oil with alternative protein and oil sources, it is of paramount importance to quantify the impact of these changes on fish performance, feed costs, fish composition and nitrogen and phosphorus wastes. The terrestrial animal production industry has, gradually, introduced mathematical models to support nutritional and dietary decisions to reduce costs by maintaining growth and animal welfare at optimal levels. In contrast, the use of modelling approaches in aquaculture species is still incipient.

At Sparos, we strive to bridge the gap between research in fish nutrition and the feed industry, and so we came up with the idea of creating a virtual environment/software where multiple feeds and feeding scenarios can be evaluated in just a few hours. Currently, Sparos offers two commercial products and related services for fish farmers and aquafeed formulators: a tool to benchmark aquafeeds and study the effects of feed composition changes on fish production performance - FeedneticsTM; and a tool to create customised feeding tables for the farm's target growth and feed - FiT. Both tools are calibrated and validated for Gilthead seabream, European seabass and Rainbow trout. Upon client request and pending data availability, Sparos can create custom calibrations for other species and/or specific strains.

Read more, HERE.

The Aquaculturists

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