Photo: Anders Söderberg
Marine Paint
A global need for better antifouling control
Researchers at University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology have an international reputation in the marine area. A couple of these scientists (Hans Elwing, Lena Mårtensson Lindblad, Mia Dahlström) made an important discovery in 2000. They found that treating a surface with medetomidine, which is used in veterinary medicine, is very effective for preventing fouling by barnacles.

On the basis of this discovery, a number of research groups at the two universities, working at the interface between marine research and research into the chemistry and physics of surfaces, made a joint research grant application to Mistra, The Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research. Mistra granted a four-year research support as from January 2003 to the programme, which was designated Marine Paint. In 2006 Mistra decided to invest further four years of research.

The first phase of Marine Paint focused on the barnacles that are one of the major problems for shipping. Presently the scope of the research has been broadened to generate research results for a sustainable paint that could control all kinds of fouling organisms.

Focus for the present phase of Marine Paint
Our present research strategies – all leading to the overall objective of “delivering recipes for commercially and environmentally optimised marine paints” are as follows:

  • The Special Focus Project concerns medetomidine properties, to support our commercial partner in their work to seek approval for medetomidine via the Biocidal Products Directive.
  • The Optimisation-Formulation-Performance research route sets out to identify efficacious biocide combinations with minimal environmental risk. Focus is on medetomidine and other antifoulants that are notified in the BPD review process. By using the emerging microcapsule technology we can tailor-make paint Formulations for each biocide combination. In the Performance research route – the efficacy and environmental profile of the most promising formulated paints will be assessed.
  • In Fundamentals we continue to generate basic and unique knowledge for the understanding of the biology of fouling organisms. Knowledge that describes mode of action, especially important regarding demands from the regulatory authorities. The gained basic understanding will also direct towards a second generation of sustainable antifoulants.
The ten biocides will be tested with respect to their individual efficacy towards the 8 most common fouling organisms. The matrix below schematically shows the different data that can be retrieved. With the help of specially developed computer algorithms the 100 000s of different combinations will be sorted and ranked in terms of efficacy.
A minor part of the combinations – those that indicate best efficacy at lowest risk – will be transferred to the formulation project for microencapsulation and later to the performance project for fouling testing in marine environment.