Lanternfish throws light on abundant protein in ocean

Visakhapatnam: When the world is facing challenges with depleting resources of rich protein food, a beam of hope shines across the Indian ocean which could prove to solve the food requirement in the immediate future.

Lanternfish, which account for over half of the oceans fishy biomass, is a potential future food. Lanternfish, which are known as mesopelagic or myctophid, grow up to a few centimetres is found abundantly across the seas.

Study on the lanternfish, which glows due to presence of bio-luminance or light producing photophor cells are found in the depths of up to 200 metres, is approved by the Indian Council of Indian Research (ICAR).

“We got a call from the ICAR to go ahead with the lanternfish project,’’ said scientists in-charge of Central Institute of Fisheries Technology Dr R Raghu Prakash. Talking to The Hans India on Tuesday, Raghu Prakash said, “there is a need to locate new and unconventional fishery resources to fill in the supply-demand gap for fish protein in the context of downward trend in production from the conventional fish stocks.”

Currently, commercial exploitation of world myctophid resources is minimal in view of plastic threat to these fish. However, myctophid resources have high potential to become a major source of fish protein for direct human consumption and for meeting fish meal, animal husbandry, poultry and oil requirement.

In view of depleting protein resources, the Ministry of Earth Sciences and Centre for Marine Living Resources and Ecology funded project “Assessment of Myctophid Resources and Development of Harvest and Post-harvest Technologies,’’ which was taken up by CIFT in collaboration with the Ministry.

Dr Prakash led the first scientific voyage to understand the distribution and diversity of myctophids in the Central Indian ocean. The scientific expedition ship started from Kochi to Port Louis in Mauritius. Nearly 18 species of myctophids were identified during the voyage.

Under the project, development of post-harvest technologies for myctophid resources, biochemical studies, nutritional evaluation, microbiological studies and aspects pertaining to utilisation of myctophids were carried out by CIFT, Visakhapatnam.

Preliminary studies have also indicated anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties of myctophid oil and its potential for use in alleviating the age associated disorders. Processes for the preparation of fishmeal, fish oil, hydrolysate and silage from myctophids were standardised.