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Transcript of Seaweeds Australia Newsletter
Welcome to the second newsletter for Sea-
weeds Australia. The release of the first news-
letter saw a flurry of activity and interest both
nationally and internationally with similar net-
works and commercial interests. This has deliv-
ered a strong network base for Seaweeds Aus-
tralia to move forward with. It is evident that the
value and need of the newsletter has been
placed as a bridge between science and the
―real world‖; a gap that continues to widen. One
Tasmanian network member who joined follow-
ing the release of the newsletter summarised
this well using a quote from a retiring Director
of the Scottish Agricultural College; "starving
people don't read "Nature". And nor, I think, do
most potential beneficiaries of research.
This second issue of the Seaweeds Australia
newsletter follows the recent International Soci-
ety for Applied Phycology Congress (ISAP
2011) that was held in Halifax, Canada. This
newsletter will outline some of the highlights
from that event, although a report will be forth-
coming through the Rural Industries Research
& Development project report website. One
great piece of news following the Congress is
the win of Australia’s bid to host the next ISAP
2014 in Sydney. This bid was initiated through
Seaweeds Australia, sponsored by RIRDC, and
was also backed by Dr. Susan Blackburn at the
CSIRO and Prof. Michael Borowitzka of Mur-
doch University; both representatives of the
Australian microalgal networks.
As a warm up to ISAP 2014 in Sydney, Austra-
lia is also hosting the 8th Asia-Pacific Confer-
ence on Algal Biotechnology in Adelaide in
2012, ―Algae for the Future‖. Further details are
provided in this newsletter and indicates that
the opportunity for Australian seaweed R&D
output and industries to make their mark on the
international stage is nigh. Seaweeds Australia
stakeholders will have a role in contributing to
both conferences and we hope to profile some
of the initiatives underway in Australia in the
lead up to these events.
In this issue we are highlighting some of the re-
search planned from recent and substantial in-
vestment by the South Australian Government
which seeks to establish South Australia as a
national leader in seaweed cultivation.
In the biotechnology section, a bit of a novel
story brings together the fields and potential col-
laborative opportunities between applied sea-
weed chemical research and high-value hydrogel
applications including groundbreaking bionics
research.
Following on from the story in the last newsletter,
which highlighted the need for seaweed food
standards, we bring to account some of the me-
dia scares linked to seaweed in food products.
This deserves some attention to address issues
that are clearly based on misinformation about
seaweed species, a lack of commonly accepted
standards for use and/or irresponsible use by
manufacturers.
Agricultural applications of seaweed in Australia
and current trends by the manufacturers of Aus-
tralian products are also highlighted and, finally,
the theme for natural resource management fea-
tures some Australian evidence for climate
change effects on macroalgae.
It is also time for the original research steering
group to meet again and update the research
and development plans and priorities for Sea-
weeds Australia. December 9.
After returning from ISAP 2014 in Canada, it is
inspiring to see increasing demand for seaweed
products across the globe. The scale and diver-
sity of the applications for seaweed imply that
there will continue to be growth in demand for
seaweed products, and Australia needs to stay
aware of the opportunities and collaborations
that can be established to take advantage of
these opportunities; many of which are multi-
disciplinary.
Pia Winberg
(Executive Officer Seaweeds Australia)
Seaweeds Australia Newsletter Issue 1:2
November 2011
Seaweed Seaweed SpeciesSpecies Profile Profile
Myriogloea Myriogloea
This thick, gelatinous spa-
ghetti like genus belongs
to the Chordariacean
family and seems to pre-
viously have been re-
corded in NSW and
southern Australia as
Cladosiphon filum. There
are therefore records
around southern Austra-
lia that may be incorrect.
If anyone has knowledge
or samples of either of
these taxa then that
would help solve a con-
fusing case of misidentifi-
cation. The polysaccha-
rides in this taxon are po-
tentially good bioactive
candidates.
Seaweeds Australia Editorial P.1
Theme: Cultivation P.2
Theme: Biotechnology P.2
Theme: Food & Nutrition P.3
Theme: Aquaculture & Agricultural P.3
Theme: Natural Resource Management P.4
Australian Events 2011 P.4
ISAP 2011 and ISAP 2014 P.5
S. Australia communication strategy P.5
Events 2011 and Network Notice Board P.6
Page 2
There is nothing new about the rheologi-
cal or gelling properties of seaweeds. In-
deed global industries have been estab-
lished on the gelling properties of sea-
weeds which are used to create texture
and maintain form in many food and cos-
metic products. In addition seaweed gels
are used industrially as they provide a
broad range of fluid and viscosity charac-
teristics and are important in fluid prod-
ucts such as paints, fire retardants and ink
jet printers. Technically, seaweed gels
have different degrees of shear and
strength properties and this depends on
the seaweed species source in question
as well as the processing of the gels.
What is evident however, is a disciplinary
or sectoral gap between seaweed knowl-
edge (taxonomy and lifehistory) and the
physical chemistry field of research. Sea-
weed gels from the commodity markets,
such as carrageen, alginate and agar,
have been processed and marketed on
food and industry shelves for a long time
now. This is purchased by researchers
and industry in the fields of physical
chemistry who go straight to their labs and
work on novel applications for gels.
What is not appreciated here is the
source of the gel—the seaweed.
This link in understanding is important as
these seaweed gels differ markedly
across the life stages of the seaweed and
especially across different species of sea-
weed. Very few seaweed species have
been investigated for their unique
rheological properties; consequently
many potentially important gelling proper-
ties are being missed. One could query as
to why there is interest in further gel types
when the food and other industrial sectors
already have suitable gels, however there
are very high technological applications
that are emerging for these gels and small
differences in the strength or flexibility of
the gels at different temperatures and pH
levels has huge consequences.
At the recent International Workshop on
Rheological and Mechanical Properties of
Hydrogels, hosted at the University of
Wollongong by ARC Centre of Excellence
for Electromaterials Science researchers
Profs Geoff Spinks and Marc in het Pan-
huis, some of the most novel applications
presented included the elusive search for
a polymer that can provide the basis for
artificial muscles. It seems that robotics
has come a long way but the remaining
hurdle to the development of high tech
robots is an artificial muscle. Similarly,
bionic body parts of the future require
gelling materials that stretch and contract
in response to chemical signals, and
spinal injury sufferers were one target
application for some of the physical gel
research using seaweed extracts. As
Prof. Paul Calvert articulated it, ―there is
a need for a dialogue between electron-
ics and cells in tissue culture‖. It seems
that the bridge between soft wet cells
and hard wired electronics needs sea-
weed gels.
In attending this workshop there was the
opportunity to present a perspective from
the field of seaweed research and high-
lighted that there are potentially many
more suitable seaweed gels in Australia’s
diverse and rich algal flora that could one
day provide a solution and deliver the
world an artificial muscle.
Southern Australia (SA) has one of the most diverse marine floras in the world with more than 1,150 species recorded of which many (~70%) are endemic to the region (Phillips 2001). This boastful biodi-versity can be attributed to both the conti-nental and marine bioregional isolation of the region as well as a legacy of produc-tive phycologists active in South Australia. South Australia is also the second state in terms of production value in aquaculture of fish species. These two attributes com-bined lend themselves to diverse opportu-nities for South Australia to develop inte-grated multi-trophic aquaculture (IMTA) systems including the development of seaweed cultivation. Aquaculture in South Australia exceeds the value of wild sea-food production and is of significant impor-tance to regional economies and employ-ment, particularly on Eyre Peninsula. However, aquaculture development has recently slowed and the Gross Value of Production from existing aquaculture in-dustries has declined. Macroalgal aqua-culture offers a new and potentially signifi-
cant regional development opportunity to add value to the infrastructure and in-vestments made in SA.
Hence South Australia will now invest approximately $1.5M into the SARDI strategy to establish South Australia as the leading state for macroalgal produc-tion and associated research and devel-opment. This is in addition to a recent FRDC funded project to investigate the potential of seabased algal cultivation at sea that could offset nutrient inputs from seacage farming of fish and provide bio-mass for other purposes.
SA is well suited for mass cultivation of macroalgae as it has large, shallow, ex-tensive bays and Gulf waters, a range of coastal land sites and zonings in prox-imity to high nutrient, yet low contami-nated, waste-water discharges, large inland areas where saline groundwater can be sourced and is often well satu-rated with CO2 and nutrients and suitable sunlight regimes for algal production.
Acknowledging that the development of such a new industry requires consider-able investment towards vertical integra-tion and market development, SARDI’s strategy encompasses a proof-of-concept land based macroalgal production facility that can use nutrient enriched waste-water streams, use the biomass to contribute to a manufactured abalone feed, and deliver evidence of other value chains for the macroalgal biomass from animal feeds, human food to bioactive extracts. Bio-economic modelling and appropriate pol-icy development is expected to provide the basis for the development of a sustain-able macroalgal aquaculture industry in SA and will assist future investment deci-sions.
The most recently funded research and development project focuses on develop-ing the culture of three taxa of macroalgae with market potential, Gracilaria, Cladosi-phon and Ulva spp., to a proof-of-concept stage using nutrient enriched waste-water streams. The macroalgal biomass will be value-added and its performance and quality evaluated. The key outputs from the project will deliver:
The physiological growth optima Culture performance and quality Bioremediation capacity Performance as abalone feeds The acceptance as human foods The types and quality of bioactives Bio-economic models & policy reviews Recommendations for government and industry participants.
Australia has a range of agricultural and
horticultural products both manufactured
in Australia and imported, however this
industry has to rely heavily on imports
due to limited production in Australia to
date. The common appreciation of sea-
weed as good for the garden is generally
understood as a ―good fertilizer‖, how-
ever international research has delivered
evidence that goes well beyond seaweed
simply delivering macronutrients to soils
and plants. In fact, contributions of nitro-
gen and phosphorous in seaweed prod-
ucts for land plants are sometimes nearly
absent. The benefits for plants from sea-
weeds come from diverse and unique
bioactive components in seaweed, and
have diverse and interactive benefits in
the plants (see insert). In some interna-
tional studies, seaweed extracts have
been shown to be nearly as effective as
Recent scares in the media regarding
―toxic levels of iodine‖ in soy milk prod-
ucts or ―seaweed killer‖ in hotel menus is
a consequence of poor knowledge
about seaweed species and suitable
uses in foods. The former of these
scares resulted from a lack of controls in
concentrating iodine from seaweed, and
there is now a class action against the
international company responsible. The
latter doesn’t seem to be linked to sea-
weed but rather poor food handling.
Despite this, the media surrounding
these events does nothing for the suc-
cessful development of what could be a
sustainable and important health and
food industry for Australia.
We need clear and hard evidence based
claims for seaweeds as a food product
to better challenge and avoid such me-
dia scares. The dichotomy of this issue
is that seaweed as a food is worth the
better part of $8B industry globally (FAO
2008 data), is eaten extensively
throughout Asia, the biggest population
on earth, and is accepted as important
for good health, yet in the west it re-
mains an elusive and poorly understood
product with strong and conflicting im-
Page 3 Issue 1:2
ages portrayed by the media.
Seaweed is not the only nutritionally impor-
tant food that has had to deal with hyped
up media scares and irresponsible prac-
tices. The partner seafood in fish and shell-
fish has dealt with extensive debate on
issues regarding heavy metal loads, bio-
toxins, anti-biotics and sustainability. Sea-
food Services Australia and other advo-
cates of the seafood industry have fought
hard, promoted and supported research on
the benefits of seafood, especially linked to
omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids. An
analogous approach for the seaweed food
sector must go hand in hand with the de-
velopment of a seaweed industry in Aus-
tralia. Australia has a good reputation for
food quality assurance and research in
health and nutrition; two characteristics
that lend themselves well to Australia con-
tributing to the lead in the development of
evidence based claims for seaweed foods;
despite being a small producer globally.
Because seaweed does belong within sea-
food, it may take advantage of an initiative
that started at the International Seafood
and Health Conference last year and that
is coming to fruition. The intent is to proac-
tively address some of the scares linked
to seafood and establish what the key
and important health benefits are through
a website where people can have a one-
stop shop regarding seafood & health
information. GILLS, or the Global Initia-
tive for Life and Leadership through Sea-
food, website was launched last month at
the IAFI World Seafood Congress in
Washington. The website was estab-
lished by Auburn University (USA), Tamil
Nadu University (India) and Universidad
de Cantabria (Spain) and can be viewed
at www.gillseafood.com.
Although in its early stages, the intent of
GILLS is to provide a repository for all
medical research related to seafood. A
unique aspect of the seaweed health
applications that can add to this knowl-
edge base are the unique health benefits
that have been demonstrated from sea-
weeds including the sulfated polysaccha-
rides and other unique metabolites. Sea-
weed researchers in the field of food and
health research will need collectively con-
tribute to GILLS and similar communica-
tion tools to deliver a consistent message
beyond the walls of science.
pesticides without the toxic activity, but
rather by a plant strengthening and resis-
tance approach (Paulert et al. 2010 and
Craigie 2010). Despite this international
research, Australia and New Zealand
remain sceptical to these results and arti-
cles have recently been published about
the ―Snake Oil or Crop Insurance‖ diver-
gent views on the issue (Good Fruit and
Vegetables May 2011).
Although crop application research has
reached high levels of sophistication inter-
nationally, Australia has lagged in the
scientific approach in demonstrating how
and why seaweeds are beneficial to land
plants and this will be essential to main-
streaming and increasing the develop-
ment of this industry and the significant
crop benefits that such applications can
contribute to.
It is encouraging that some well accepted
companies like Seasol are therefore em-
bracing a scientific approach to delivering
evidence for seaweed based applications
in agriculture. Although Seasol has been
manufactured in Australia since 1975, it
did not gain significant notoriety until the
late 1990’s but has still stayed on the
fringe of mainstream horticulture and re-
ceived much opposition from conventional
agronomists. This was partly due to a gen-
eral misunderstanding about its scope of
action. For example, seaweed applica-
tions that protect plants during times of
stress were too often confused as a
―fertiliser effect‖’. Products like Seasol
however are now well established in
grapes, almonds, vegetables, turf and
ornamental horticulture and this has trig-
gered investment in R&D on the functional
links between seaweeds and crops.
In 2010, Dr Tony Arioli was appointed as
the director of R&D at Seasol to pursue
this. Recruited from the Bayer Crop Sci-
ences Cotton R&D Centre, an ultimate
goal is to be the first Australian seaweed
company to achieve the registration of a
kelp product in agriculture.
http://www.rdaillawarra.com.au/home/our-priorities/green-jobs/green-jobs-illawarra-project/transforming-australia-jobs-industry-and-the-green-economy-conference-and-smart-living-expo-24th-26th-july-2011/
Page 4
Seaweeds Australia was invited to present
at the recent Transforming Australia con-
ference at the Novotel in Wollongong.
The conference was organised by the Re-
gional Development Australia (RDA)
Green Jobs Illawarra Project, and the
theme was Jobs, Industry & the Green
Economy Conference. There were many
interesting presentations on sustainability
opportunities and a particular focus on
jobs creation. An impressive line up of
speakers including Climate Commission-
ers Tim Flannery, and Will Steffen, as well
as national, state and local government
leaders and frontline local government
initiatives. Waste re-use and sustainable
building and materials industries domi-
nated the presentations at the conference,
and the massive gains that can be made
by making the existing Australian frame-
works more efficient was outlined very well
by Ana Skarbeck of ClimateWorks who
presented the Eureka award winning cost
curve of where Australia can make gains.
It was a great opportunity to showcase the
potential for algal industries to add to the
Ana Skarbeck’s presentation can be
found at the Transforming Australia
website, as can the presentation repre-
senting the potential role for seaweed
industries in Transforming Australia:
In the south east coast of Australia, a well
documented hotspot for sea surface tem-
perature rise (see figure), seaweeds are
starting to feel the heat. A recently pub-
lished study by seaweed researchers at
the University of NSW found that Delisea
pulchra, a common red seaweed in tem-
perate south eastern Australia is more
susceptible to bacterial infection that
causes bleaching when exposed to higher
temperatures.
The study showed that warmer waters
were consistently and positively correlated
with higher frequencies of bleaching in
seaweed populations, but that this was
not linked to light levels. Temperature
itself seemed to be the cause of bleach-
ing, and bleached seaweeds had low lev-
els of antibacterial chemical defences
relative to healthy populations of this sea-
weed.
In support of the bacterial infection theory,
microbial communities associated with
bleached algae were distinct from those
on the surfaces of healthy seaweeds, and
direct field based tests showed the impor-
tance of algal chemical defences.
The molecules associated with anti-
bacterial activity in D. pulchra includes the
brominated furanones and these were also manipulated in the field to show that a
lack of these furanones resulted in increased bleaching under elevated water tem-
peratures.
Considering the scale of this habitat forming species in South Eastern Australia,
these findings can imply that there will be significant ecosystem effects from a decline
in abundance of D. pulchra with consequences for the food chain and species such
as sea urchins that are linked to chemical cues from this seaweed (Williamson et al.
2000).
This paper was published by Campbell et al. in Global Change Biology (2011) 17,
2958–2970, doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2011.02456.x . Photograph sourced at : http://
old.bees.unsw.edu.au/school/researchstudents/campbellalexandra.html
Sea Surface Temperature anomalies in the Tas-man Sea as recorded over the last 30 years.
future suite of new, sustainable, regional
industries in Australia with net carbon re-
ductions through both cultivation and appli-
cations in agriculture. Considering that
agriculture is one of the existing Australian
industries with low cost of carbon reduction
gains as outlined by Ana Skarbeck, the
macroalgal appli-
cations industries
should embrace
such an opportu-
nity to engage
with traditional
agricultural indus-
tries.
For the remainder of 2012 and into 2013,
Seaweeds Australia will continue to oper-
ate as a stakeholder network under an
organised yet informal structure. Already
the interest in Seaweeds Australia has
increased with the distribution of the
newsletter to over 100 national stake-
holders across all themes, as well as in-
terested networks internationally including
similar applied phycology networks, bio-
tech companies, researchers, chefs, agri-
culture and aquaculture industries and
energy companies. In addition there is a
strong interest from the general public,
most often in relation to the food and
health properties of seaweed.
Once again, the
great potential for algal biofuels was a
key focus of ISAP 2011. However in con-
trast to 2008, there was an emphasis on
the grounding of true production rates
and yields of algal biomass in scaled up
conditions. There were fewer inflated
claims of miracle production levels and
culture systems for algae, however this
did not imply that algal production for
biofuels is off the radar. In contrast the
presentations in this field were con-
structive and addressed a range of the
limiting factors including strain selection,
culture conditions and extraction proc-
esses to optimise the production of algae
for biofuels. These sessions covered
both microalgae and macroalgae.
Aligned with the conference theme of
―scaling up‖, there was an emphasis on
identifying the barriers to moving research
outcomes from the laboratory and demon-
stration plants to real world conditions.
This included not only the technical chal-
lenges of going from a small culture vessel
to large ones, but the need for multidisci-
plinary contributions in overcoming a
range of scaling up barriers from the culti-
vation, engineering and processing to the
economics of production.
The application of algae in health and nu-
trition was a key focus of ISAP 2011 and
emphasized the need for delivering consis-
tent and reliable biomass or extracts with
demonstrated bioactivity.
An expanded summary of ISAP 2011 has
been written for Seaweeds Australia and
will be available through the Rural Indus-
tries Research & Development website in
the near future. In addition a range of se-
For this diverse group of stakeholders to
most efficiently communicate without the
hassle of alerts to items of low interest
(a common feature of networks), stake-
holders of Seaweeds Australia will be
able to be included in the network to
receive alerts and information that suits
their level of interest (table below). The
newsletter will be emailed out to every-
one currently on the stakeholder list, and
an additional email will be sent as an
invitation to join the LinkedIn network.
LinkedIn provides a pubic forum for
stakeholders to discuss, promote and
follow initiatives in their field of interest.
The Seaweeds Australia LinkedIn group
will be established with 6 key discus-
Page 5 Issue 1:2
sions including Cultivation, Biotechnology,
Food & Nutrition, Aquaculture and Agricul-
ture Applications and Natural Resource
management. In addition, further discus-
sion groups can be established by network
stakeholders and may range from sea-
weed art to high tech methodologies.
In addition, a website has been estab-
lished and is currently hosted by the
University of Wollongong (http://
www.uow.edu.au/science/research/
smfc/seaweedsaustralia/index.html). It
is envisaged that this website can grow
to host lists of publications within the
themes by stakeholders of Seaweeds
Australia.
Communication & Extension Stakeholder Categories
Seaweeds Australia Newsletter Newsletter Only Stake-holders
LinkedIn Stakeholders LinkedIn R,D&I Sub-group Stakeholders
(email link for each newsletter released)
Seaweeds Australia LinkedIn (newsletter alerts, theme and general discussion groups online, promotions, jobs)
Seaweeds Australia LinkedIn R,D & I Sub-group (as for LinkedIn stakeholder but with access to Sub Group Discussions on Research, Development and In-dustry priorities and strategies for Seaweeds Australia)
lected papers from the congress will be
published in the scientific peer reviewed
Journal of Applied Phycology.
Another effort at ISAP 2011 by Seaweeds
Australia, and supported by microalgae
representatives Prof. Michael Borowitska
of Murdoch University and Dr. Susan
Blackburn of the CSIRO, was to bid to
host ISAP 2014 in Sydney, Australia. Af-
ter an ISAP Executive Committee voting
process, Sydney Australia has won the
bid. This means that in the next 3 years,
Australia will be the host to two peak in-
ternational conferences; APCAB in 2012
and ISAP in 2014 (see events on page 6).
As indicated in the previous newsletter,
Seaweeds Australia stakeholders with an
interest in contributing to the organisation
of this event are encouraged, as are
members of the microalgal networks. Al-
though the core organising committee has
been established, there are sure to be
constructive inputs towards the develop-
ment of themes, industries for exhibitions
and sponsorship of the event. Opportuni-
ties to contribute ideas to ISAP 2014 will
exist through the LinkedIn forum (see
below) as well as future editions of the
newsletter.
The Shoalhaven Marine &
Freshwater Centre at the Uni-
versity of Wollongong is the
host organization for Sea-
weeds Australia
Please send any ccomments,
contributions or novel notes on
seaweed to [email protected].
Seaweeds Australia
c/o Shoalhaven Marine &
Freshwater Centre
Shoalhaven Campus
PO Box 5080 Nowra DC
NSW 2541 Australia
Page 6
Ashmore Foods (Hobart, Tasmania - seafood
specialists) are launching a new seaweed food
product. In conjunction with Marinova (Hobart
based Fucoidan manufacturer and supplier),
Ashmores is supplying Undaria pinnatifida as
Wakame (fronds) and Mekabu (sporophylls) to
restuarants and wholesalers in Hobart, Mel-
bourne, Sydney and Brisbane. This is a fresh
blanched snap frozen product. You may be
more familiar with the imported salted or
dried wakame available generally throughout
Australia. Now it is possible to buy Australian,
clean and green, grown in Tasmania's pristine
oceanic waters.
“Strengthening strategic and successful algal industries for
the future: key knowledge and skills gaps”