Introduction: Novacq™ is a microbial biomass ingredient with a unique blend of bioactive molecules that is produced via a novel fermentation technology developed by Commonwealth Science and Industrial Research Organisation, Australia (CSIRO) and licensed to Ridley. Prawns and shrimp fed with NovacqTM grow on average faster and are healthier. Significant improvements in the production methodologies for Novacq™ have led to the development of NovaqPro™, a version of Novacq™ with greater biopotency. To estimate the biopotency of NovaqPro™ when fed to Penaeus vannamei and P. monodon, a meta-analysis was carried out using data from 5 and 2 trials, respectively. Trials consisted of 2 to 23 treatments of 4 replicates each and treatments differed amongst each other by having 10% of NovaqPro™ coming from different production batches, and appropriate negative controls without NovaqPro™. The basal diets were the same within each trial. All P. vannamei trials were conducted at Andaman Aquatic Research Centre (AARC), Thailand, and P. monodon trials were carried out by CSIRO in its Bribie Island site in Queensland, Australia. The experimental layout was similar across trials which used juvenile animals with about 0.5g initial weight, and were fed experimental feeds for 6 weeks keeping the animals under standard site practices. When describing the results of the trials, NovaqPro™ biopotency is measured as the percentage difference in weight gain between each replicate and its relevant control group. This dataset yielded 236 and 156 independent datapoints for P. vannamei and P. monodon, respectively.
Statistical methods: The inverse variance method was used to combine results of biopotency and estimate pooled effects of all treatments in both P. vannamei and P. monodon populations. Heterogeneity test: I-square test was used to verify the heterogeneity between treatments. As heterogeneity was statistically significant, random effects model was used. Bias test: Egger test was used to verify that the results did not have direction or bias. Plotting results: Forest, Funnel and Baujat Plots allowed for the visualization of all treatments included in the study, their corresponding standard error, the heterogeneity and variability of each treatment, and its contribution to the final result verifying the absence of bias.
Results: The biopotency findings for these trials can be interpreted as the capacity of NocaqPro™ to improve, on average, weight gain for P. vannamei or P. monodon fed at 10% in a commercial-type feed, under the standard experimental protocol described herein. Results are summarized in the Tables below.
Conclusions: Feeding NovaqPro™ to P. vannamei and P. monodon at 10% in a commercial-type feed in trials significantly improved weight gain, on average, by 51.64 and 39.31%, respectively. The large number of data point comparisons (236 and 156 for P. vannamei and P. monodon, respectively) provides a high degree of robustness to the current analysis.