UMBC has secured $1.5 million in congressional funding to establish the UMBC Center for Precision Aquaculture, an interdisciplinary effort aimed at revolutionizing land-based fish production through real-time monitoring and smart technology.
The new center brings together faculty and students from UMBC’s marine biotechnology, chemistry and biochemistry, and computer science and electrical engineering (CSEE) departments. The interdisciplinary team will strive to make domestic aquaculture more efficient, healthier for fish, and environmentally responsible—while helping reduce America’s massive seafood trade deficit.
“Fish are the last ‘hunt-and-gather’ animal crop,” says Yonathan Zohar, professor and chair of marine biotechnology and the new center’s lead. “To relieve pressure on our oceans, fish—like other animal proteins—must be produced through farming or aquaculture.”
Bringing a “blue revolution”
The U.S. imports over 90 percent of its seafood and nearly all its Atlantic salmon, contributing to American seafood imports exceeding exports by roughly $20 billion, the largest deficit across all agricultural crops. And aquaculture is the fastest-growing sector of global and U.S. agriculture, yet the U.S. ranks only 18th in production.
To address these challenges, Zohar and his team at the Aquaculture Research Center (ARC) at the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor have long pioneered recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS)—self-contained, land-based tanks that recycle nearly all their water and discharge nothing into the environment. Compared to the floating, open-ocean pens currently used to farm fish, other perks of land-based operations include preventing commingling of captive fish with wild stocks, limiting disease exposure, the ability to bring fish to market size more quickly and more often throughout the year, and reduced transportation costs and emissions associated with bringing fresh seafood to inland areas. The ARC even converts solid fish waste into biogas that could supply part of the facility’s energy needs.
Researchers Keiko Saito (left) and Yonathan Zohar (right) discuss the remediation of liquid waste, which is carried out by bacteria in tanks like this one. (Brad Ziegler/UMBC)
The new Center for Precision Aquaculture will add a high-tech layer to this work. Advanced underwater imaging, optical sensors, and artificial intelligence will track fish biomass, behavior, body condition, stress signals, and early disease indicators in real time. Producers can then intervene quickly and optimize tank conditions for better growth, health, and welfare.
Zohar, whose decades of work in sustainable aquaculture recently earned him the Distinguished Lifetime Achievement Award from the United States Aquaculture Society, said the project “will contribute to the U.S. and global ‘blue revolution’ by helping develop the next generation of highly efficient and environmentally responsible aquaculture technologies.”
Connecting disciplines, pursuing impact
The center’s strength lies in its cross-department collaboration. Brian Cullum, professor and chair of chemistry and biochemistry and co-investigator on the grant, brings long-standing expertise in multispectral imaging (MSI). His group will use MSI to detect subtle color changes in the visible, infrared, and UV light spectra that are invisible to standard cameras and signal early disease or unwanted sexual maturation, both of which can hurt profitability.
“In high-density RAS tanks, disease can spread rapidly, so early detection is critical,” Cullum says. “This project combines multispectral imaging with AI to identify stressed or maturing fish early, allowing growers to remove them from the tank.”
Emmanuella Duruye, a UMBC chemistry Ph.D. student in Brian Cullum’s lab, is taking the lead on the multispectral imaging aspect of the project. (Brad Ziegler/UMBC)
“With global demand for protein rising, improving aquaculture systems means contributing to a more stable and responsible food supply,” says Emmanuella Duruye, a Ph.D. candidate in Cullum’s lab. “I am excited about the multidisciplinary aspect, and being part of a team whose goal is to improve systems that make real-world and long-term impacts.” She is focused on improving non-invasive monitoring of hidden stress signals via multispectral imaging.
Rebecca Williams, assistant professor of CSEE, is a co-investigator on the project, as is Don Engel, associate professor of CSEE. Beamlak Bekele, a master’s student in Williams’s group, is developing computer vision tools tailored to underwater environments. “I am excited about this project because it connects computer science with aquaculture, allowing me to apply computer vision to a real-world problem,” Bekele said. “As the project progresses, it can contribute methods that improve the application of underwater vision data to other scenarios as well.”
Beamlak Bekele (left), Rebecca Williams (center), and Don Engel (right) are developing software to analyze heatmap images of the fish tanks, as pictured on the screen. (Brad Ziegler/UMBC)
Ph.D. students Sean Ravel and Max Prager; postdoctoral fellow Matthew Stromberg, Ph.D. ’26, environmental engineering; and John Stubblefield, ARC laboratory director, are all working with Zohar at IMET. “Early maturation is one of the biggest challenges in salmon aquaculture, and I’m excited to be part of the cutting-edge research to better understand and manage it,” Ravel shares. “We are building tools that let us understand fish in ways that are only possible because we combine biology, engineering, and AI into a single, integrated system.”
Piloting the future of aquaculture
The new funding will support a pilot RAS system that integrates the new precision technologies. ARC will serve as a demonstration site for industry, hands-on student training, and public outreach. It builds directly on UMBC’s existing strengths, including ongoing USDA- and NOAA-funded salmon research and a popular Sustainable Aquaculture course. The center will also help train the next generation of skilled workers through internships and research opportunities for high school, undergraduate, and graduate students.
By combining UMBC’s deep foundation in RAS technology with state-of-the-art imaging and AI, the Center for Precision Aquaculture positions Maryland as an emerging hub for innovative, sustainable seafood production—reducing reliance on imports, easing pressure on wild fisheries, and delivering healthy food to American tables.