Kurt Servin from Guadalajara, Mexico has an academic background in Oceanographic and Marine Sciences and a professional background in commercial aquaculture, aquafeed nutrition, with both shrimp and fish management as well as business intelligence and talent development in commerce and the biosciences.
He has worked with leading international companies, private enterprises, R&D agencies and government institutions. Kurt Servin is specialized in functional feed additives and gut modulation of shrimp to enhance their welfare and quality for the end-consumer.
Kurt completed his Ph.D. at the University of Plymouth, UK, where he tested natural prebiotics and probiotics “beneficial bacteria” to enhance the immune competence of shrimp to improve their disease resistance and stress tolerance. As such, his work involves the application of advanced molecular techniques to quantify intestinal microbiology or ‘microbiome’ and to link this with dietary formulations containing functional feed additives in nutrition. This work has serious implications with regard to mitigating our previous dependence on antibiotics in our quest to seek effective alternatives that do not result in antimicrobial resistance in the food chain to both animals and humans.
He is also undertaking consultancy work to assess the potential of new candidate aquaculture species for Latin America and in developing new containment technologies for marine fish in coastal waters and land based facilities such as RAS systems. Kurt is helping to promote such strategies in his native Mexico and the Americas with a keen interest in job and wealth creation based on sound ethical principles. Kurt has actively attended prestigious aquaculture meetings for many years and been an invited speaker on a number of occasions in Mexico and the USA. More recently, 2019, he has contributed to review articles and peer-reviewed publications in leading scientific journals notably as a co-author (2019) in the journal ‘Sustainability’ involving an international consortium and other MatureDevelopment members. This paper on shrimp feed sustainability has been widely acclaimed.
Kurt is committed to safe, efficient and sustainable seafood production to benefit the human population globally.