Novel Ingredients from Seaweed Extracts (NISE)

Seaweed

A global industry

The global seaweed industry is worth around £4 billion, 80% of this revenue is derived from food products. Seaweed derivatives are used in processed foods, dairy products, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, medicines and garden fertilisers and potentially could prove to be reliable sources of useful ‘bioactive’ proteins, polysaccharides, antioxidants and fatty acids.

A developing market

With such a breadth of high value applications, seaweed cultivation industries have developed and now produce more than 90 % of market demand. There is growing interest in developing commercial cultivation of seaweed around the British Isles, with several initiatives focused on their use in biofuels. The current project has a different focus on the considerable opportunities for higher value food applications. As well as piloting seaweed production in the offshore environment of the Eastern Irish Sea, we are identifying and refining high value extracts from a range of seaweed species.