ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Marine Biotechnology and Bioproducts
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmars.2025.1630093
This article is part of the Research TopicBioactives of the Multicellular Marine FloraView all articles
Sea vegetables for brine-based inland cultivation
Provisionally accepted
- 1Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops, Großbeeren, Germany
- 2University of Bayreuth, 95447, Germany
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Brine 1 = purified brine used as cultivation media Brine 2 = purified brine water after application in thermal bath and filtration (≥0.7µm) Rich in nutritional proteins and health-promoting compounds, edible macroalgae, known as "sea vegetables", provide a valuable and needed alternative food source for a growing human population. Controlled environmental cultivation is a promising approach to provide freshly harvested macroalgal biomass in inland areas. In this context, natural saline groundwater (brine) offers an innovative solution for land-based, urban indoor cultivation of marine organisms. Here we investigated the suitability of regional brine from the Brandenburg area (Central Europe) for the indoor cultivation of the three different macroalgae: Ulva compressa ("flat gut weed"), Ulva fenestrata ("sea salad") and Cladophora sp. (Chlorophyta) For the evaluation of brine as cultivation media, we investigated biomass growth (e.g., specific growth rate, SGR), pigment composition (carotenoids, chlorophylls) at different life stages (e.g., germlings, and reproductive thalli). Responses towards the brine media varied between species.Ulva compressa showed comparable to elevated growth and pigment concentrations when cultivated in brine media, whereas Ulva fenestrata was negatively affected by the brine-based media and stagnated in its reproduction and growth. Also, Cladophora sp. was initially hampered by the brine media but showed a positive shift in growth after 45 days exposure. For all taxa high levels of chlorophylls were measured in brine media compared to control media.Assuming that this reflects a stress response during acclimatization to a new cultivation environment, the study provides a promising strategy for macroalgal cultivation in saline groundwater with enhanced levels of photopigments. Given the rising demand on fresh harvested algal biomass, we suggest to foster the initiated research to further develop the "sea vegetable" production in inland areas.
Keywords: Saline agriculture, Carotenoids, Ulva compressa, Ulva fenestrata, macroalgae cultivation 1. Introduction
Received: 16 May 2025; Accepted: 20 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Denisova, Schreiner, Baldermann and Fricke. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Anna Fricke, Leibniz Institute of Vegetable and Ornamental Crops, Großbeeren, Germany
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