The Partners

Microboost consortium is composed by portuguese companies: Allmicroalgae and SPAROS, as well as Research Institutes, namely Ciimar and the collaborative lab dedicated to industrial research on algae, Green CoLAB. There are also two Norwegian partners: the Norwegian Institute for Water Research (NIVA) and the University of Bergen. The project’s cornerstone is the established collaboration between research institutes and industry players, which ensures and promotes the transition of fundamental research into the authentic Blue Biotechnology business, explicitly benefiting the microalgae and aquaculture sectors.

ALLMICROALGAE, Pataias, Portugal

Allmicroalgae has been a leader in microalgae cultivation for years. Different microalgal species are grown to provide a variety of nutrients and other bioactive compounds. Flat panels and tubular photobioreactors are used for autotrophic production, while heterotrophic microalgal growth occurs in fermenters, meeting the company’s needs for rapid generation of high-quality inocula. Allmicro maintains an R&D department that is involved several National and European projects.Allmicro works with over 30 national and 50 international institutions in fields such as engineering, animal and human nutrition, animal production, pharmaceutical, cosmetics, genetics, and microbiology, among others.

NIVA, Oslo, Norway

NIVA is Norway’s leading institute for basic and applied marine and freshwater research. The world-class expertise of NIVA is multidisciplinary, with a broad scientific scope that includes environmental, climatic, and resource-related fields. The Norwegian Culture Collection of Algae, which is a member of the World Federation for Culture Collections (WFCC) and the European Culture Collections Organization, provides NIVA with exclusive access to over 2000 microalgal strains (ECCO). Furthermore, as a pilot test platform, NIVA has built a new Algae R&D Facility (up to 10,000 L cultivation volume at Solbergstrand). NIVA’s microalgae research group will use the unique microalgae biobank to provide microalgae-based technical support and solutions for various R&D requests. In MICROBOOST, NIVA is responsible for the new target microalgae selection and enhancement, pilot cultivation, as well as proper quality control for biomass production.

SPAROS, Olhão, Portugal

PAROS is a technology-driven SME focused on the creation of new products and customized nutritional solutions for the aquaculture market. It combines a strong scientific background in fish nutrition and aquaculture with a flexible pilot-scale feed technology platform. For the past years, SPAROS has been engaged in an intensive R&D effort, including the development of tools focusing on mechanistic modeling and omic technologies to predict fish biological performance and feed utilization under various nutritional and environmental scenarios. This effort resulted in the commercialization of feed products for the aquaculture (Hatchery Feeds), biomedical (ZEBRAFEED), and ornamental (AQUATICA) markets. In recent H2020 and national projects, SPAROS has tested alternative sustainability-driven ingredients/formulations (including algal biomasses and extracts) for aquafeeds, including evaluation on immuno-competence and fish stress resistance improvement. This is why SPAROS will lead functional feed formulation, its manufacturing, and optimization for the different species, and participate in physiological parameters effort and the integrative data analysis of the multi-omics data.

GREEN COLAB, Faro, Portugal

Green CoLab is a non-profit private organization that serves as a collaborative platform between research and industry. Its research and innovation strategy is based on the exploration of macro and microalgae as a necessary component for the food, feed, nutraceutical, bioenergy, wastewater, and cosmetic industries. CoLab is made up of a research center (CCMAR), a state laboratory (LNEG), a university (UAveiro), and four companies: ALLMICROALGAE, NECTON, ALGAPLUS, and SPAROS. The goal of this consortium is to advance R&D on algae cultivation and algal biomass downstream processing, with the ultimate goal of generating a portfolio of new commercial products and services for the industrial partners.The CoLab team has expertise in all stages of algal production, from lab to large-scale production, from scale-up to production, harvesting, and commercialization. The CoLab’s research lines cover the majority of the algal biotechnology fields proposed in the MICROBOOST project, such as algal strain optimization for enhanced target biocompounds and algae biomass characterization.

CIIMAR

CIIMAR brings together a multidisciplinary and highly skilled team to work at the cutting edge of knowledge and innovation, with the mission of promoting transdisciplinary research, technological development, and training, thereby contributing to advances in scientific knowledge and the sustainability of marine and coastal environments. CIIMAR’s research domains include GLOBAL CHANGES AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES, AQUACULTURE AND SEAFOOD QUALITY, and MARINE BIOTECHNOLOGY, all of which address critical economic and societal challenges and contribute to the achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. To that end, this institution is heavily involved in partnerships, research center networks, industry, public engagement, and literacy. MICROBOOST will rely on the expertise of the CIIMAR team in fish immune responses and disease resistance.

BERGEN UNIVERSITY, Bergen, Norway

University of Bergen (UiB) is a young, modern, and international university, promoting cutting-edge research in several fields that cover three strategic areas: Marine research, Climate, and Energy transitions, and Global challenges. Also contributing to society with an excellent education, interdisciplinary cooperation, and dissemination of knowledge and innovation. The University is engaged in the European Union’s Framework programs for research, technological development, and innovation. It has been designated as a European Research Infrastructure and a Research Training Site in several scientific fields. Sea Lice Research Center (SLRC) is one of the research groups hosted by the Department of Biological Sciences at UiB, and it has become world leading in sea lice research, having strong experience in collaborating with various industrial companies. SLRC has developed state-of-the-art experimental facilities and procedures for conducting experiments with salmon louse and similar parasites, being involved in studies related to the development and clinical assessment of new anti-sea lice medicine, clinical trials with vaccine candidates, and various studies testing and validating feed ingredients. SLRC has both the skills and infrastructure to conduct the proposed part of the MICROBOOST project.