South Dakota Patent of the Month – November 2021
The fishing industry has been over exploiting fish populations for years now. Between unethical fishing practices, bycatch waste, and an increasing human population, wild fish are dwindling. In recent years, we have seen an increase in the more sustainable plant-derived sources of protein to fully or partially replace fish meal in aquaculture diets. These plant protein sources have some limitations of their own. The processing methods can be costly, and certain protein types (eg. soybean) may lack some amino acids such as taurine.
Prairie AquaTech, LLC are experts in producing powerful plant-based nutritional ingredients. Part of their mission is to develop fermentation technology to create high protein ingredients. Recently, they have developed a microbial-based process to produce a high quality protein concentrate. This process effectively converts plant derived celluloses into bioavailable protein through aerobic incubation processes.
This microbial process works well to produce a concentrated protein source which can be used in animal feeds or for human consumption. Plant protein sources provide a less expensive protein source and overcomes the concern of transmitting diseases through feeding animal proteins to animals of the same species. The microbial-based process can use yeast-like fungi to convert carbohydrates into high-quality protein concentrates. This requires a conversion culture wherein the protein material is blended with water and combined with hydrolytic enzymes and the yeast-like fungi. The slurry is incubated for up to 120 hours or as long as needed for the carbohydrates to be consumed. The high-quality protein concentrate is recovered from the conversion culture by alcohol precipitation and centrifugation. The product can then be treated as needed based on it’s final destination – for instance with antibiotic treatments or processing steps.
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