Delivery of HUFA, probionts and biomedicine through bioencapsulated Artemia as a means to enhance the growth and survival and reduce the pathogenesity in shrimp Penaeus monodon postlarvae

One of the major problems in the shrimp culture industry is the difficulty in producing high-quality shrimp larvae. In larviculture, quality feeds containing a high content of highly unsaturated fatty acids (HUFA) and ingredients that stimulate stress and disease resistance are essential to produce healthy shrimp larvae. In the present study, Penaeus monodon postlarvae (PL15) were fed for 25 days on an unenriched Artemia diet (control; A) or on a diet of Artemia enriched with either HUFA-rich liver oil of the trash fish Odonus niger (B), probionts Lactobacillus acidophilus (C1) or yeast-Saccharomyces cerevisiae (C2)] or biomedicinal herbal products (D) that have anti-stress, growth-promoting and anti-microbial characteristics. P. monodon postlarvae fed unenriched Artemia exhibited the lowest weight gain (227.9 ± 8.30 mg) and specific growth rate (9.95 ± 0.05%), while those fed the HUFA-enriched Artemia (B) exhibited the highest weight gain and specific growth rate (362.34 ± 12.56 mg and 11.77 ± 0.08%, respectively). At the end of the 25-day rearing experiment, the shrimp postlarvae (PL40) were subjected to a salinity stress study. At both low and high (0 and 50‰) salinities, the group fed the control diet (A) experienced the highest cumulative mortality indices (CMI) 935.7 ± 2.1 and 1270.7 ± 3.1, respectively. Those fed diet D showed the lowest stress-induced mortality, and CMI were reduced by 31.1 and 32.3% under conditions of low and high salinity stress, respectively. A 10-day disease challenge test was conducted with the P. monodon postlarvae (PL40–PL50) by inoculating the shrimp with the pathogen Vibrio harveyi at the rate of 10⁵–10⁷ CFU/ml in all rearing tanks. P. monodon postlarvae fed probiont-encapsulated Artemia diets (C1 and C2) exhibited the highest survival (94.3 and 82.3%, respectively) and lowest pathogen load (V. harveyi) in hepatopancreas (5.2 × 10² ± 9.0 × 10 and 4.6 × 10² ± 9.0 × 10 CFU g⁻¹, respectively) and muscle (2.0 × 10² ± 6 × 10 and 1.7 × 10² ± 8.6 × 10 CFU g⁻¹, respectively) tissues. The shrimp that were fed the unenriched Artemia (Control; A) showed the lowest survival (26.33%) and highest bacterial load in the hepatopancreas (1.0 × 10⁵ ± 5 × 10³ CFU g⁻¹) and muscle (3.6 × 10⁴ ± 6 × 10² CFU g⁻¹). The shrimp fed the herbal product (D)-enriched Artemia also exhibited enhanced survival and reduced V. harveyi load in the tissues tested compared to the control diet (A) group. The results are discussed in terms of developing a quality larval feed to produce healthy shrimp larvae.