Understanding Penaeid Prawn Sex Determination and Developing Monosex Induction Strategies for Commercial Application

  • Project Number: 2008/713
  • PhD Student: Mr Andrew Foote
  • Student Affiliation: Flinders University
  • Primary Supervisor: Dr Graham Mair
  • Co-Supervisor: Dr Melony Sellars
  • Mentor: To be advised

About the Project

Commercial culture of monosex (all-female) penaeid prawn populations has the potential to increase yields from pond culture by up to 30% as females grow larger than males. Despite this, there are no technologies that allow the culture of all-female populations on a commercial-scale.

Globally, the understanding of penaeid prawn sex determination is limited, making the development of robust technologies to produce 100% female populations difficult. Furthering the basic understanding of the genetic and biochemical processes involved in penaeid prawn sex determination will greatly influence future research directions.

This project aims to identify and characterise sex determination in penaeids including the confirmation of the hypothesis of female heterogamety. The project will develop and optimise techniques such as gynogenesis (the generation of uni-parental maternal only inheritance) and sex reversal, which are valuable tools for the elucidation of the genetic basis of sex determination. The knowledge developed will allow the investigation and development of commercially relevant techniques to produce 100% female populations.

This project will also have significant impact on industry as it will identify avenues for substantially improving farm profits by producing all-female populations. Production data from the Australian industry indicates sexual differentiation and maturation of Penaeus monodon (Giant Tiger Prawn) under commercial culture conditions occurs by five months of age, by which age females are on average approximately 30g and males are approximately 25g. This species is often harvested at later ages by which time the size difference between females and males is even greater.

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This page was last updated: 30th March 2009