The use of Probiotics in Aquaculture

Abstract

Disease outbreaks are being increasingly recognized as important constraints to aquaculture production and trade, affecting the economic development of the sector in many countries. An increase of productivity in aquaculture has been accompanied by ecological impacts including emergence of a large variety of pathogens and bacterial resistance. These impacts are in part due to the indiscriminate use of chemotherapeutic agents as a result of   management practices in production cycles. There is an urgent need in   aquaculture to develop microbial control strategies. One of the alternatives to antimicrobials in disease control could be the use of probiotic bacteria as microbial control agents. Most of the work reviewed in this article describes commercial hatchery experiments, probiotic research in the culture of fish, crustaceans and live food with an evaluation of results obtained so far. Directions for further research are discussed.

Key words: Probiotics, Chemotherapeutic, Fish Culture, Crustaceans, Water Quality,