Recent advances in the probiotic application of the Bacillus as a potential candidate in the sustainable development of aquaculture

With plenty of resources and great potential, aquaculture is the most rapidly developing food production industry in the world and fisheries are essential to its socio-economic well-being. However, aquatic animals face significant challenges due to their increased susceptibility to infectious diseases, various stresses and also the growing demand for food and supply of livelihood attributable to the upsurge of global population. The application of probiotics in aquaculture has drawn interest as a potential microbes to preserve the health and welfare of several aquatic fauna as well as to reduce the overuse of antibiotics and synthetic drugs. Probiotics Bacillus is one of the many potential microbial possibilities that can synthesize compounds having anti-microbial properties, non-toxic as well as non-pathogenic to the fish and has the ability to sporulate, which allows them to withstand extreme climatic conditions, quorum quenching properties, all of which make it a better probiotic option than the others. Bacillus can be used to enhance the feed utilization, growth, stress response, antioxidant defense, immune function, water quality, reproductive health and disease resistance of aquatic animals, all of these have been the focus of discussion of the present review. Bacillus combined with prebiotics, as synbiotics and other compounds such as medicinal herbs, polyphenols and organic acids to form synbiotic synergism has very promising role in aquaculture, but their mode of action is still under scrutiny, hence required through systematic investigation. Commercialization of the probiotic should be done to enhance the application of probiotics at the farm level more intensively, hence increased aquaculture production, but definitely there is a lacunae in the successful commercialization of the probiotic Bacillus. Paraprobiotics and postbiotic form of the Bacillus spp. have employed in the aquaculture sector to improve the general health of the aquatic organisms, but application of both the forms in fish is very rare compared to other vertebrates. Finally, this review is dealing with the application of Bacillus or combined with prebiotics, the synbiotics and in combination with other compounds like medicinal herbs, polyphenols and organic acids as well as different form like encapsulated, paraprobiotics and postbiotics to enhance the culture of aquatic fauna have been compiled in preparation for further investigation and advancement of Bacillus spp. use in the development of sustainable aquaculture.