Sustainable Sea

Aquaculture is part of the solution in tackling the world’s growing food demand. In particular, seaweed aquaculture has the potential to feed the world, fight climate change, and restore our ocean. However, the rapid growth of seaweed production is accelerating the spread of infectious diseases that harm the seaweed and lead to socioeconomic instability due to the loss of the farming income. We are developing a machine learning based aquaculture monitoring and response system that uses  microbiome data to predict and prevent disease. Our system will reduce livestock losses, lead to cost savings, and promote sustainable food production. We will build our system based on microbiome data. Microbiome population and diversity are indicators of the health and resilience of the seaweed ecosystem  because the microbiome changes and adapts swiftly to the earliest indication of harmful pathogens. This enables our sensor system to predict disease outbreaks before they occur and warn seaweed farmers to take timely preventative actions. Prevent of seaweed disease outbreak in Philippines and Tanzania alone would save over 100,000 tonnes of seaweed, which can removal 2,000 tonnes of nitrogen and sequester 27,000 tonnes of carbon emission per year.