ECOAT- Estratégias inspiradas na natureza para novas tecnologias anti-incrustantes sustentáveis

ECOAT aims to respond to the CHALLENGE of developing innovative marine AF technologies, to accelerate the ban of the aggressive mainstream AF coatings in use, by allying the principles of bioactive natural products and bio-inspired polymeric matrices. In addition, ECOAT aims to contribute to understand the role of early biofouling communities’ chemical and biological diversity associated with the best-performing AF prototypes during in situ proof-of-concept trials. ECOAT scientific basis is grounded on the HYPOTHESIS that bioinspired surface solutions with multifunctional AF activity will privilege the colonization of a particular biofouling community which preserve a stable, low diversity, and AF-effective biome. This research approach is innovative as it joins a multidisciplinary team on complementary fields of science, including natural products chemistry, ecotoxicology, materials science, bioengineering and chemical ecology to create a new generation of effective and sustainable AF technologies. These can find different industrial applications in coatings and 3D-printed materials. This approach will also disclose key factors (secondary metabolites, microbial constitution) modulating the chemical and biological nature of the early biofouling communities associated with ECOAT prototypes. ECOAT will advance scientific knowledge by creating a multifunctional strategy combining the synergistic strengths of different antifouling approaches being pursued in the different scientific fields, enhancing antifouling properties and environmental compatibility of materials, while providing solutions for different end-user industries (shipping, aquaculture, etc). Considering the state-of-the-art and innovation gaps in the field related with lack of alternative AF eco-solutions and bioinspired approaches across disciplines (natural antifoulants and biopolymers), the major SCIENTIFIC QUESTION behind ECOAT research plan is: May synergistic bioengineered nature-based strategies provide the next generation of effective and environmental safe AF materials to be implemented as effective sustainable technologies to prevent biofouling-associated issues? To answer this question, SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES are proposed: 1) to produce previously validated and patented AF compounds discovered by the PI team, and select the most promising ones based on their potentially low toxicity to the environment, using ecotoxicological bioassays and environmental risk model predictors (activities A.2 e A.3; milestone 2); 2) perform biofunctionalization of different bio-based polymeric systems with the selected bioinspired compounds, and produce ECOAT prototypes using 3D-printing and coating technologies (A.4; milestone 3); 3) proceed to test ECOAT prototypes (3D- miniaturized cages and coated panels) in situ in marine scenarios compatible with future maritime industrial applications (A.5; milestone 4); 4) assess the chemical and biological identity of the biofouling first colonizers on the best-performing prototypes through untargeted metabolomics and high-throughput sequencing (HTS) of the 16S and 18S rRNA genes, respectively, assessing which are the key factors or chemical cues (microbial community structure, secondary metabolites) modulating biofouling succession or inhibition effect for each produced prototype AF technology (A.6; milestone 5).