The use of ozone to improve water quality in recirculation aquaculture
systems is widespread. In these same systems, the use of brine shrimp
Artemia spp. as the first food item for larval fish is also very comm
on. The potential of brine shrimp to inoculate culture water with path
ogenic bacteria is well understood, and the increasing availability of
ozone makes it reasonable to consider ozone as a potential disinfecta
nt of brine shrimp. In this study, brine shrimp nauplii were exposed t
o ozone (0.75 g/h) for various periods (10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 min). S
urvival of nauplii was greater than 90% in all but the 30-min exposure
(84.4%), and bacterial reduction was nearly 100% for all exposures. O
zone, because of its demonstrated potential to disinfect brine shrimp
without causing significant mortality, is a viable alternative to chem
ical disinfection of nauplii before feeding to larval fish.