Scientists at a university in Japan have decoded the genome of the popular brown seaweed ito-mozuku (Nemacystus decipiens), providing data that could someday be critical to local farmers along the tropical coastline of Okinawa and elsewhere. At Okinawa, farmers raise rows of delectable seaweed and harvest thousands of tons of the crop each year. But scientists at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) said that pollution and rising ocean temperatures might affect their yield, forcing farmers to adopt new cultivation techniques. Researchers led by professor Noriyuki Satoh of the OIST Marine Genomics Unit (OIST-MGU) with Koki Nishitsuji, first author of the study and a staff scientist in the OIST-MGU, conducted a study that presented the world’s first draft genome of ito-mozuku published on March 14, 2019 in Scientific Reports.

Domingo, L. C. (2019, March 21). Seaweed can become a major food source. The Manila Times, p. B5.