Species identification of livefood flightless fly (Torinido-shoujoubae) through DNA barcoding.

Torinido-shoujoubae, as it is called in Japanese, is a flightless Drosophila sp. that is sold commercially in Japan. This Drosophila sp. is often used as feeds for model organisms such as reptiles and spiders. There is no scientific name provided for the fruit fly that is known as Torinido-shoujoubae, as well as any historical background or data behind this species. There has been a previous study that was conducted through morphological characteristics analysis of the body as well as the male copulatory organ and has been estimated as Drosophila hydei. The objective of this study was to determine the species of this unidentified fly known as Torinido-shoujoubae based on a molecular evidence with a DNA barcoding. Samples were purchased from four separate suppliers to examine whether there are any differences between them. COI regions were amplified using PCR and the sequenced results were aligned against two databases, NCBI and BOLD. Torinido-shoujoubae samples provided from all suppliers were confirmed to be D. hydei.

The American cockroach (Periplaneta americana) residue could partially replace the dietary puffed soybean meal in the Three-yellow chickens.

Periplaneta americana residue is a byproduct of using Periplaneta americana in pharmaceutical research and development for extracting active ingredients. Three hundred Three-yellow chickens were selected for the experiment and randomly divided into 6 groups (5 replications per group, 10 chickens per replicate): the control group (group A) was fed a basal ration, and the experimental groups (groups B, C, D, E, and F) were fed experimental diets in which P. americana residue replaced puffed soybean meal at proportions of 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100%, respectively, for a period of 42 d. The aim was to assess the impact of different levels of P. americana residue on the growth, survival, intestinal morphology, digestive enzyme activity, intestinal flora, and intestinal transcriptional responses of Three-yellow chickens. The results indicated that the increase in P. americana residue levels had a linear and quadratic impact on the average daily gain (ADG) and feed conversion ratio (FCR), respectively. The ADG was notably greater in the 40% group than in the 100% group, while the FCR was significantly lower in the 20% and 40% groups than in the 100% group (P < 0.05). Protease, lipase, and amylase activities exhibited a quadratic increase with increasing concentrations of P. americana residue (P < 0.05). Protease and lipase activities were notably greater in the 20% and 40% groups than in the 0% group (control group), amylase activity was significantly greater in the 40% group than in the 0% group (control group) (P < 0.05). Duodenal crypt depth (CD) decreased quadratically with increasing P. americana residue (P < 0.05). The duodenal villus height/crypt depth ratio (V/C) was significantly lower in the 100% group than in the 60% group (P < 0.05). The intestinal villus height (VH) increased quadratically with increasing levels of P. americana residue. The VH in the 60% group was significantly greater than that in the 0% (control group), 20, 80, and 100% groups (P < 0.05). The Chao and Ace indices demonstrated linear and quadratic increases with increasing levels of P. americana residue, while the Pd index showed a quadratic increase with increasing levels of P. americana residue (P < 0.05). The relative abundance profile of Lactobacillus exhibited a linear and quadratic decrease with increasing levels of P. americana residue, with the 100% group showing a significantly lower abundance than the 0% (control group) and 40% groups (P < 0.05). The transcriptome results showed that P. americana residue could enhance the digestive system by promoting vitamin, fat, carbohydrate digestion and absorption, cholesterol metabolism, etc. In conclusion, P. americana residue can replace puffed soybean meal without negatively affecting the growth performance of three-yellow chickens. The low and medium groups had positive effects on the growth performance, digestive enzyme activity, intestinal morphology, intestinal flora, and substance digestion and absorption of three-yellow chickens. The recommended replacement of P. americana residue for puffed soybean meal in the diets of three-yellow chickens ranged from 20% to 60%.

Fatty Acid Profile and Escherichia coli and Salmonella sp. Load of Wild-Caught Seaweed Fly Fucellia maritima (Haliday, 1838) (Diptera: Anthomyiidae).

World aquaculture is expected to continue to grow over the next few decades, which amplifies the need for a higher production of sustainable feed ingredients for aquatic animals. Insects are considered good candidates for aquafeed ingredients because of their ability to convert food waste into highly nutritional biomass. However, commercially available terrestrial insect species lack n-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFAs), which are essential biomolecules for marine cultured species. Nevertheless, several coastal insect species feature LC-PUFAs in their natural fatty acid (FA) profile. Here, we analysed the lipidic profile of wild-caught seaweed fly Fucellia maritima, with a focus on their FA profile, to evaluate its potential to be used as an aquafeed ingredient, as well as to screen for the presence of pathogenic bacteria. Results showed that the flies had a total lipid content of 13.2% of their total dry weight. The main classes of phospholipids (PLs) recorded were phosphatidylethanolamines (PEs) (60.8%), followed by phosphatidylcholine (PC) (17.1%). The most abundant FA was palmitoleic acid (C16:0) with 34.9% ± 4.3 of total FAs, followed by oleic acid (C18:1) with 30.4% ± 2.3. The FA composition of the flies included essential fatty acids (EFAs) for both freshwater fish, namely linoleic acid (C18:2 n-6) with 3.4% ± 1.3 and alpha-linoleic acid (C18:3 n-3) with 3.4% ± 1.9, and marine fish, namely arachidonic acid (C20:4 n-6) with 1.1% ± 0.3 and eicosapentaenoic acid (C20:5 n-3) with 6.1% ± 1.2. The microbiological analysis found 9.1 colony-forming units per gram (CFU/g) of Enterobacteriaceae and no presence of Salmonella sp. was detected in a sample of 25 g of fresh weight. These findings indicate that Fucellia maritima biomass holds the potential to be used as an additional aquafeed ingredient due to its FA profile and the low count of pathogenic bacteria, which can contribute to the optimal growth of fish and shrimp with a low risk of pathogen transfer during the feed production chain.

Aquaculture ecosystem microbiome at the water-fish interface: the case-study of rainbow trout fed with Tenebrio molitor novel diets.

BACKGROUND: Sustainable aquaculture relies on multiple factors, including water quality, fish diets, and farmed fish. Replacing fishmeal (FM) with alternative protein sources is key for improving sustainability in aquaculture and promoting fish health. Indeed, great research efforts have been made to evaluate novel feed formulations, focusing especially on the effects on the fish gut microbiome. Few studies have explored host-environment interactions. In the present study, we evaluated the influence of novel insect-based (Tenebrio molitor) fish diets on the microbiome at the water-fish interface in an engineered rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) farming ecosystem. Using 16S rRNA gene metabarcoding, we comprehensively analyzed the microbiomes of water, tank biofilm, fish intestinal mucus, fish cutis, and feed samples. RESULTS: Core microbiome analysis revealed the presence of a highly reduced core shared by all sample sources, constituted by Aeromonas spp., in both the control and novel feed test groups. Network analysis showed that samples were clustered based on the sample source, with no significant differences related to the feed formulation tested. Thus, the different diets did not seem to affect the environment (water and tank biofilm) and fish (cutis and intestinal mucus) microbiomes. To disentangle the contribution of feed at a finer scale, we performed a differential abundance analysis and observed differential enrichment/impoverishment in specific taxa, comparing the samples belonging to the control diet group and the insect-based diet group. CONCLUSIONS: Omic exploration of the water-fish interface exposes patterns that are otherwise undetected. These data demonstrate a link between the environment and fish and show that subtle but significant differences are caused by feed composition. Thus, the research presented here is a step towards positively influencing the aquaculture environment and its microbiome.

[Assessment of the Multidimensional Performances of Food Waste Utilization Technologies in China].

In recent years, China has made great efforts to carry out source-separation in municipal solid waste management; in particular, the utilization of food waste has received increasing attention. Food waste-utilizing technologies, including anaerobic digestion, aerobic biological treatment, and insect feed conversion, are currently applied in China. However, in the existing cases, there were several disadvantages, such as a low rate of utilization, significant environmental impacts, poor economic benefits, etc., as well as a lack of systematic analysis and comprehensive assessment of the performances of food waste utilization technologies. In this study, a four-dimensional performance assessment method (resource efficiency, environmental impact, economic feasibility, and social effect, with 21 indicators) was established for assessing the life cycle process of food waste utilization technologies. We collected detailed information of 14 typical food waste utilization cases in China, and the results showed that the average scores of anaerobic digestion and insect feed conversion were 58.39 and 59.65, higher than those of the aerobic biological treatment (49.16). The highest scores among all subdivision technologies were centralized black soldier fly conversion and mesophilic wet anaerobic digestion, which were 67.14 and 60.82, respectively. With respect to the technologies of different treatment capacities and distribution modes, i.e., centralized and decentralized technologies, the resource efficiency and economic benefit scores of the former were 13% and 62% higher than those of the latter, whereas the environmental impacts and social effect scores of the latter were 8% and 34% greater than those of the former, respectively. In practice, the utilization technology of food waste should be chosen according to local conditions, such as the physical and chemical properties of food waste, the classification of municipal solid waste, financial affordability, collection and transportation distance, etc.

Folate contents in insects as promising food components quantified by stable isotope dilution.

Concerning the increasing population, edible insects are of growing interest due to several advantages such as sustainable production and as a source of high-quality nutrients. One of the less studied nutrients are folates, in the context of insects is folates, which play an important role in human metabolism. In the article, we describe how six different insect species are reared and extracted for five common folate vitamers by high-performance liquid chromatography interfaced with tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS). For this purpose, house crickets (Acheta domesticus-adults), Jamaican field crickets (Gryllus assimilis-adults), discoid cockroaches (Blaberus discoidalis-nymphs), migratory locusts (Locusta migratoria-adults), mealworms (Tenebrio molitor), and lesser mealworms (Alphitobius diaperinus) were investigated. The total folate content differs between 59.1 ± 6.50 and 143 ± 11.1 µg/100 g. Also, the feed, which was adapted to the needs of the insects and differed for some species, was extracted for their total folate content. The four different feed compositions (rapeseed, chicken feed, bramble leaves, and a mix of chicken feed, wheat bran, and carrot/apples) showed a folate content of about 100 µg/100 g, except for hay, where the content was 300 µg/100 g. In general, the insect folate content is comparable to other food and seems to be a promising source of folates. However, the amount of consumption needed to meet the requirement must also be considered. Moreover, the effect of different influencing factors is not yet entirely clear and needs further investigation.