Alan Ansell Research Aquarium

The Alan Ansell research aquarium at the Scottish Marine Institute supports our research, teaching and commercial activities, and is a facility that serves scientists from around the world through infrastructure programmes like ASSEMBLE and EMBRC. It extends over 160m2 and consists of indoor and outdoor facilities. The indoor facilities include a open plan experimental area, a mezzanine floor for dry and self-contained wet experiments, numerous photoperiod and constant temperature rooms, and an observation room.

Deep-water coral in aquarium Plaice eggs (Photo: B Batty) Echinoculture at SAMS Alien species - C mutica, males

The aquarium is serviced with:

pristine sea water from the Lynne of Lorne
reliable water pump system: duplicate, monitored and alarmed
water pumped via sub-sea sand filters into four 44m3 reservoirs

flow-through water system with capability for full or partial recirculation

compressed air and localised power supplies (230V ac, 110V ac and 12V dc)

hard-wired data and video communication links to an adjacent observation room

computer-controlled, flexible lighting system
a selection of GRP stock tanks of the following sizes: 1000mm (length) x 500mm (width) x 300mm (depth); 1000mm x 1000mm x 500mm, and 1800mm x 1800mm x 900mm. We also have a few larger tanks and many smaller standard tanks in both glass and acrylic.

Our facilities - fully refurbished in 2008 - meet the highest hygiene standards exceeding UK Home Office requirements.

An in-house multi-skilled technical support team is available to assist in the design, development, setting up and running of bespoke experimental systems to conduct aquaculture or marine ecology related research projects.

The aquarium has been used for studies of various topics including fish physiology, fish feed trials, biology of deep-sea coral, biological rhythms, echinoculture, seaweed cultivation, larval development, behavioural studies, and the biology of non-native species.