Radio Frequency Tag on Salmon

September 21st, 2008 by Andrew

RFID (Radio Frequency ID) is an electronic tag that can be attached to an object for wireless identification for automation, tracking, authentication and logistic purposes.

RFID has gained momentum in the recent years due to advances in electronics microminiaturisation, making it possible and more effective to be used in vast applications where size, reliability and cost are critical [see (1)]. It used to be bulky, but nowadays RFID tag can be shrunk to smaller than the size of a grain of rice.

Interestingly however, one of the first applications of RFID technology was not to track goods passing through a supply chain, but rather to track living beings moving through an ecosystem.

RFID tagging has been used as early as 1980’s in US to identify and track salmon migration patterns in the largest river in Northwest America (Columbia river) that has lots of complex system and man-made dams (2).

Used as microchip implant (3), RFID tag is used to collect detailed information such as: sub-species, age, waterway and habitat of origin, condition of the fish, and so on which helped authorities to better manage dam operations to minimize the impact on fish and wildlife. RFID tags have been used as well in various salmon hactheries in Canada for tracking and statistical purposes.

There might be risk using RFID as implant in animals, because tumors at the site of implantation have been reported in laboratory mice and rats(4). However, RFID is still considered safe by various institutions such as US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and World Small Animal Veterinary Association (WSAV), (5).

A group of Japanese researchers reported that they have experimentally made RFID tag from Salmon DNA in 2005 (6), so that the organic RFID might be more compatible to be implanted in Salmon compared with silicon based RFID in the future.

In short, I believe that RFID Technology would be potentially beneficial to be used for Automated monitoring and identification in our salmon industry.

More Info:

(1) RFID:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RFID

(2) Salmon tracking:

http://www.itworldcanada.com/Pages/Docbase/ViewArticle.aspx?id=idgml-f074f0e3-3f68-4820-a841-b37de22673ab

(3) Microchip Implant:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microchip_implant_(animal)

(4) Implant & tumor:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/08/AR2007090800997_pf.html

(5) RFID is safe:

http://www.wsava.org/Chip999.htm and http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6237364/

(6) Salmon DNA RFID: