Seaweed farming has long been touted as a nature-based climate solution, but expanding it into the open ocean has been stymied by strong currents and dilute nutrients. Now, researchers at Zhejiang University, with collaborators at Guizhou University and the Ningbo Innovation Center, have designed a modular, origami-inspired system that could overcome these barriers, according to a study published (DOI: 10.1016/j.ese.2026.100769) on 28 September 2026 in Environmental Science and Ecotechnology.
The Seaweed Origami-inspired Aquaculture System (Seaweed OAS) uses a shell-core structure to slow local flow, provide attachment surfaces, and store slow-release nutrients. Each unit is assembled from 12 variant pentagonal modules into a dodecahedron-like shell, with an internal nutrient space and a central buoyancy ball. In simulations, a single optimized unit under 2.0 m s⁻¹ currents produced 2,607.7 cm³ of suitable growth volume—17 times larger than a spherical reference. A six-unit hexagonal array boosted per-unit suitable volume by 2.1-fold.
“By reshaping flow around each module, the system creates quiet microhabitats where seaweed can attach and grow, while the same module stores slow-release nutrients,” the authors said. They added that cooperative wake interactions can amplify performance: upstream units shield downstream ones, increasing suitable growth volume per unit.
The global implications are vast. The team’s mapping identified 10,335 million hectares—28.5% of the global ocean—as potentially suitable for deployment. Macroalgae already contribute roughly 1.5 petagrams of carbon to global annual net primary production, and farm sediments can bury about 1.87 ± 0.73 tons of CO₂e per hectare per year, roughly twice the rate of adjacent non-farmed areas. If validated over longer deployments, the Seaweed OAS could support open-ocean cultivation for food, feed, biomaterials, and carbon sequestration without existing offshore infrastructure.
However, the authors caution that long-term cultivation outcomes, deep-ocean carbon storage, and the ecological effects of material degradation remain unverified. They call for long-term offshore trials to quantify seaweed growth, structural durability, material ecotoxicity, and the fate of sequestered carbon. Siting must also consider shipping lanes, ice cover, temperature, nutrient ratios, flow speed, and marine protected areas.
The research was funded by the National Key R&D Program of China, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, and other provincial and university grants. The system’s modular design, which includes connection modules with controllable degradation, could eventually allow carbon-rich biomass to sink to the deep ocean for long-term storage. As interest in ocean-based climate solutions grows, this origami-inspired approach offers a potentially scalable route to expand seaweed farming into the open ocean. For more information, visit http://chuanlink-innovations.com.
