The object of this paper is to explore if there is a more environmentally friendly and ecologically sustainable alternative to the copper oxide based marine antifouling paints commonly used today.

VIRTUE has received EU funding of 310224 euros through the "Erasmus + Strategic Partnership School program" to develop and internationalise the marine part of VIRTUE.

We have written a chapter for the book “Exemplary Practices in Marine Science Education - A Resource for Practitioners and Researchers” (Springer).

The book will be published in spring 2018.

The purpose of the book is to inform, inspire, and provide an intellectual forum for practitioners and researchers in this particular context. Proposed subject areas include sections on marine science education in formal, informal and community settings.

After a seven months' voyage, the T/S Gunilla moored at the historic port town of Portsmouth this weekend (June 13-14 2015), while the project leaders of Virtue, Susan and Mikael stayed in a nearby hotel after a short flightfrom Gothenburg.

What does marine growth look like at the other side of the Atlantic? Now students from Öckerö upper secondary high school in Sweden can answer that question.

There is a big difference in fouling depending on the material used, according to a German study.

In Virtue CDs of polycarbonate is used, but you have  every possibility to use also other material. In a school project in Kiel, Germany, they have  tested various types of substrate in the form of garbage, to see what is growing on them. The results show that fouling (mainly barnacles and mussels) prefer glass over wood and alumninium.

The Japanese oyster, Crassostreas gigas, is an oyster native to the Pacific coast of Asia. It has become an introduced species in North America, Australia, Europe, and New Zealand. The Japanese oyster has spread through accidental introductions either through larvae in ballast water or on the hulls of ships, but is has also been introduced to replace the native oyster stocks which were seriously dwindling due to overfishing or disease. In some places in the world, though, it is considered to be an invasive species.

During 2005-2007 the replica of the Swedish East Indiaman "Götheborg" sailed to China around the world and back home - with Virtue discs attached to the front of the ship's bow.