By Hanping Wang, Senior Scientist
After two years of planning, correspondence, coordination, and writing, the book Sex Control in Aquaculture is in the process of being published by Wiley and Blackwell in the summer of 2018. The Editor-in-Chief is Dr. Hanping Wang, Senior Scientist at the Ohio State University South Centers aquaculture research facility, in addition to the co-editors Dr. Francesc Piferrer of Spain and Dr. Song-Lin Chen of China. The first comprehensive book of its kind, Sex Control in Aquaculture, covers basic theory for sex control and sex control practice in major aquaculture species worldwide.
The book contains forty-one chapters and the contributors are internationally recognized scientists from around the globe. Currently, aquaculture, the fastest growing food-producing sector, contributes about 50 percent of the world’s food fish based on the Food and Agriculture Organization’s recent report. Sexual dimorphism in growth performance, ultimate size, and gonad value (e.g. caviar) in a wide spectrum of fish species make the sexes unique from each other for aquaculture production for human consumption. On the other hand, energy expenditure for reproduction related processes and activities, including gonadal development, courtship, chasing, mating, breeding, competition, and parental care, etc., are undesired in terms of food production. Therefore, sex control and monosex production knowledge and technologies are extremely important for aquaculture professionals and industries to improve production, reduce energy consumption for reproduction, and eliminate a series of problems caused by mixed sex rearing, and for conservationists to control invasive species using sex control approach. This publication will provide very useful scientific information for commercial use, biological sciences, and for aquaculture researchers. For more information about the book, please visit: https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1119127262.