The effects of marine farm-scale sequentially integrated multi-trophic aquaculture systems on microbial community composition, prevalence of sulfonamide-resistant bacteria and sulfonamide resistance gene sul1.

Aquaculture, one of the most important food production practices worldwide, faces serious challenges of mitigating the detrimental impacts of intensive farming on the environment and increased prevalence of antibiotic resistance. To develop an environment-friendly aquaculture system, a land-based and farm-scale sequentially integrated multi-trophic aquaculture (IMTA) system was established for farming Chanos chanos in southwestern Taiwan. In this system, fishes are cultured in combination with organic extractive shellfish and inorganic extractive seaweed.