Institute of Marine Research is the largest marine institute in Norway and covers marine living resources, marine environment and aquaculture. The main task is to provide advice to Norwegian authorities on aquaculture and the ecosystems of the Barents Sea, the Norwegian Sea, the North Sea and the Norwegian coastal zone. The aim of research and management advice provided by IMR is to ensure that Norway’s marine resources and aquaculture industries are managed and developed within a sustainable frame.

Role in the AQUAEXCEL3.0 project:

IMR provides one facility in the TNA and is involved in all the Networking Activities, as well as in WP5 and 6.

Key persons involved:

Dr. Per Gunnar Fjelldal is a principal scientist working on fish production biology including sexual maturation and deformity development. He will be the responsible scientist for salmon isogenic lines at IMR and will be involved in the GSC transplantation studies (T5.1). He has published more than 110 peer reviewed manuscripts.

Dr. Ragnar Nortvedt is station manager at Matre Research Station and has more than 30 years of experience in fish welfare, nutrition, and slaughter quality, both as principal scientist and from the industry. He has published about 50 peer reviewed manuscripts.

Dr. Anna Wargelius has a long-term experience in aquaculture and reproduction with emphasis on functional genomics and identification of genetic loci underlying phenotypic traits. She leads the first group that have established gene editing (knock-out) in Atlantic salmon using Crispr-Cas9. She has published 46 peer reviewed manuscripts. Anna will be a key scientist in Task 5.3.