Research, Development and Commercial Applications of Bioactive Seaweed Substances in Health Products

Seaweeds are arguably, collectively the largest marine biomass and contain a wide range of bioactive substances with nutritional, pharmacological and other biological activities highly valuable in many potential industrial applications such as functional foods, nutraceuticals, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, biomedical materials, fertilizers, etc. In these applications, the bio-compatible, non-toxic and hydrophilic nature of most bioactive substances derived from seaweed raw materials offer unique health benefits which are difficult to obtain with land-based substances, natural products or synthetic ingredients. With the advance of aquaculture technologies and the development of new efficient extraction techniques, seaweed-based bioactive substances have a broad scope for sustainable and environmentally friendly development with a high potential of economic utilization.

Keywords: Seaweeds; Natural products; Phyco chemicals; Secondary metabolites; Bioactivities