A sustainable utilization of aquaculture wastewater for the production of commercially important tilapia fish and plants (mint and chickpea) in improved integrated aqua-agriculture system. (February 2023) - Alameen, A. Muhammad
Abstract: The present study was aimed to investigate the culturing of fish and the mint and channa-plants in integrated NFT aquaponics system by using the waste waters. The physico-chemical characteristics of the waste-water were reduced at the end of experiment but the growth, weight and survival were found to be high in experimentally raised organism. Likewise, the proximate compositions viz.; protein (30.37 ± 1.62 %), carbohydrate (7.28 ± 0.35 %), lipid (16.34 ± 0.82 %), moisture (6.38 ± 0.18 %), and ash (8.30 ± 0.15 %) were high in the NEFT-raised organisms. Also, the total fatty acids (56.45 %) and amino acids (75.69 %) were found to be high which contained SFA, MUFA, PUFA, EAA and NEAA. And, among the two cultured plants, the M. piperita showed higher growth (18.2 ± 0.14 cm) and weight (5.16 ± 0.19 g) than the C. arietinum (17.11 ± 0.02 cm-growth; 5.09 ± 0.02 g-weight). In pigments accumulation, chlorophyll 'a' was high in both M. piperita (6.86 ± 0.06 mg/l) and C. arietinum (6.77 ± 0.25 mg/l). Antioxidant activities was high in mint plant followed by channa plant in relation to control. Graphical abstract: Unlabelled Image Highlights: Mint and channa plants integrated cultivation with tilapia fish. NFT system provided maximum growth of L. calcarifer . The protein and lipid contents were predominant in fish and plants. SFA were higher in O. mossambicus followed by PUFA and MUFA. Mint extracts consist higher antioxidant properties.