Portland, Maine-based MariCal, a privately held animal health and nutrition biotechnology company, has begun a research collaboration agreement with Saudi Arabia's National Prawn Company (NPC).

The research collaboration project utilises MariCal's proprietary calcium sensing receptor (CaSR) technology in targeting improvements in shrimp aquaculture production.

NPC is a fully integrated Desert Coastal Aquaculture (DCA) company that currently produces 12,000 tonnes of antibiotic-free shrimp per year, and the company intends to expand the project capacity of 45,000 tonnes by 2013 using CaSR technology.

The joint R&D effort with NPC will help further develop MariCal's technology to improve aquaculture and all food animal production worldwide, according to H. William Harris, MariCal's President & Chief Scientific Officer.

MariCal is a privately held animal health and nutrition biotechnology company, and have 32 issued and pending patents. MariCal's research is focused on animal health and nutrition and the development of the CaSR technology for performance enhancement, prophylactic and. therapeutic applications, and general animal health.