Soy-in Aquaculture Research Program

For the last two years the United Soybean Board and state soybean boards in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa and Ohio have funded a major aquaculture research program at seven universities led by Paul Brown at Purdue University. The project is determining the importance of several compounds in soybean meal that may limit soybean meal use by various aquaculture species. Some of the compounds investigated have been soy lectins, trypsin inhibitors, isoflavones, saponins and oligosaccharides. The goal is to assess the relative importance of the various antinutitional factors in soybean meal and then use traditional soybean breeding, transgenic medications and/or optimized processing and extrusion techniques to eliminate these bioactive compounds. There is also an international component that targets research activities to increase soybean meal use by fish farmers in Southeast Asia. These studies are working with local cooperators in conducting pond and ocean cage studies to demonstrate the value of commercial feeds containing high levels of soybean meal.

Hart, Steven and Paul Brown. 2005. Soy-in aquaculture partnership studies soybean meal use in fish feeds. Global Aquaculture Advocate. June p66-68.