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Graphical abstract:

The high worldwide amount of residues derived from the banana harvest is an opportunity to create synergies between the banana industry and aquaculture, from a circular economy perspective. The present work objective is to evaluate the inclusion of banana by-products, such as banana pseudo-stem and banana flower in tilapia feeds, and to explore the extracts from the banana flower on the development and health in tilapia juveniles. Three consecutive feeding trials were performed to evaluate the test by-products inclusions: Experiment I) with 0%, 2.5%, 5%, 15% and 20% of banana pseudo-stem; Experiment II) with 0%, 0.2%, 0.5%, 1% and 3% of banana flower; and Experiment III) with 3% of banana flower against its correspondent organic extract and residue of the extraction. Salinity stress challenges were conducted after the feeding trials in Experiments II and III. From the obtained results, up to 5% of banana pseudo-stem and 3% of banana flower inclusion were suitably regarded the fish growth and the liver health, also, as the essential fatty acids proportion in the muscle, despite the reduction in total lipid percentage. Regarding the stress challenges, the flower and more specific, the remaining residue from its organic extraction, appears to regulate the levels of plasma cortisol and glucose and reduce the oxidation parameters in fish liver and muscle, which may be due to the polyphenols present in both, the whole banana flower and in its organic extraction residue.

•Aloe veraindustry generates an important quantity of by-products.•The Mugilidae family is composed by marine low trophic level species.•Up to 6% of the by-product of Aloe veracan be used in diets for Liza aurata.

Environmental factors such as nutritional interventions during early developmental stages affect and establish long-term metabolic changes in all animals. Diet during the spawning period has a nutritional programming effect in offspring of gilthead seabream and affects long-term metabolism. Studies showed modulation of genes such as fads2, which is considered to be a rate-limiting step in the synthesis of n-3 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3 LC-PUFA). However, it is still unknown whether this adaptation is related to the presence of precursors or to limitations in the pre-formed products, n-3 LC-PUFA, contained in the diets used during nutritional programming. This study investigated the combined effects of nutritional programming on Sparusauratathrough broodstock diets during the spawning period and in broodfish showing higher or lower fads2expression levels in the blood after 1 month of feeding with a diet containing high levels of plant protein sources and vegetable oils (VM/VO). Broodfish showing high fads2expression had a noticeable improvement in spawning quality parameters as well as in the growth of 6 month old offspring when challenged with a high VM/VO diet. Further, nutritional conditioning with 18:3n-3-rich diets had an adverse effect in comparison to progeny obtained from fish fed high fish meal and fish oil (FM/FO) diets, with a reduction in growth of juveniles. Improved growth of progeny from the high fads2broodstock combined with similar muscle fatty acid profiles is also an excellent option for tailoring and increasing the flesh n-3 LC-PUFA levels to meet the recommended dietary allowances for human consumption.