This study evaluated graded dietary supplementation with sterol-enriched yeast hydrolysate (SYH) in late-laying yellow-feathered broiler breeder hens. A total of 720 55-week-old hens received 0, 0.2, 0.5, or 0.8 g/kg of SYH for six weeks after a one-week adaptation period. SYH is a composite product containing sterols, mannan, nucleotides, and amino nitrogen; therefore, the observed effects cannot be attributed to sterols alone. Eggshell strength increased at 0.5 and 0.8 g/kg, whereas fertility and hatchability were unaffected. The 0.5 g/kg group showed the highest ovarian index values and the greatest quantities of 5–12 mm yellow follicles. The 0.8 g/kg group showed the highest serum reproductive hormone and immunoglobulin concentrations, together with the highest reactive oxygen species and cytokine concentrations. Hepatic and ovarian superoxide dismutase activity increased selectively, whereas most other antioxidant indices were unchanged. Ovarian FSHR, CYP19A1, and VDR mRNA expression showed concentration-specific patterns. The strongest peripheral endocrine response at 0.8 g/kg did not coincide with the most favorable ovarian developmental response. Under the conditions of this study, 0.5 g/kg represents a candidate inclusion concentration for further validation rather than a confirmed optimum.

The effects of dietary supplementation of enzyme-microbe co-fermented Ganoderma lucidum spent substrate (EFGLS) on growth performance, apparent nutrient digestibility, organ indices, and cecal microbiota in yellow-feathered broilers are investigated. Healthy broilers (450 individuals of 22 days age) of similar body weight were randomly assigned to three dietary treatments (five replicates/treatment, 30 birds/replicate). A control group received a corn-soybean meal-based basal diet; treatments received diets containing 1.5% or 3.0% EFGLS. Over six weeks, treatment-group broilers exhibited significantly greater average daily gain and a lower feed-to-gain ratio compared with the control group (p < 0.001); differences in apparent nutrient digestibility in EFGLS-supplemented groups were not significant. A thymus index was significantly higher in the 1.5% than 3.0% EFGLS group (p < 0.05); Pielou's evenness, Shannon, and Simpson indices of cecal microbiota were significantly higher in the 3.0% EFGLS group than control group (p < 0.05); and a dominance index was significantly higher in the control group than in treatment groups. Under study conditions, dietary supplementation with EFGLS improved growth performance in broilers, associated with favorable changes in apparent nutrient digestibility, immune organ development, and cecal microbial community structure. Accordingly, we recommend a dietary supplementation level of 1.5% EFGLS.

This study assessed the effects of adding slightly acidic electrolyzed water (SAEW) to drinking water (0.3 and 0.6 mg/L) for 15 consecutive days on the growth performance, digestive enzyme activity, amino acid transporter gene expression, antioxidant activity, and immune function in weaned piglets. Using a randomized complete block design with pen as the experimental unit, 144 healthy weaned piglets were randomly assigned to three groups with four replicate pens per group according to weight and sex. During the entire experimental period, the average daily gain and average daily feed intake of the SAEW groups were significantly higher than those of the control (CON) group (p < 0.05). As compared to the CON group, the levels of α-amylase, β-amylase, lipase, and proteases in the duodenum increased in both SAEW groups (p < 0.05). Furthermore, 0.6 mg/L SAEW positively affected the mRNA levels of CAT1, PepT1, CAT2, EAAC1, rBAT, b0,+ AT, and 4F2hc in the jejunum and duodenum (p < 0.05). Regarding immune function, SAEW significantly decreased intestinal secretory immunoglobulin A levels in a dose-dependent manner (p < 0.05), while no significant changes were observed in serum immunoglobulin concentrations between the SAEW groups and the CON group. In terms of antioxidant status, SAEW significantly increased superoxide dismutase and glutathione peroxidase activities, but also increased malondialdehyde content in a dose-dependent manner. Despite the stronger promotion of intestinal amino acid transporters under 0.6 mg/L SAEW, this advantage failed to generate extra growth benefits alongside elevated oxidative damage. In conclusion, both tested SAEW concentrations exert positive effects on piglet growth and digestion; comprehensively balancing production benefits and redox safety, 0.3 mg/L SAEW is the optimal drinking water dosage for weaned piglets.

Panting is one of the earliest and most prominent behavioral responses of chickens under heat stress. More importantly, panting is inherently a temporally continuous state rather than an instantaneous event. However, existing vision-based methods usually determine panting from beak opening in individual frames, which contradicts the nature of panting and therefore cannot provide reliable assessment. To address this limitation, this study proposes a Cumulative Panting Ratio (CPR), which quantifies sustained open-beak behavior associated with panting by tracking and accumulating instantaneous open-beak events within a temporal sliding window. To support consistent estimation of sustained open-beak behavior and CPR, a cascaded Detection-Tracking-Classification pipeline is constructed to explicitly decouple body-level tracking from fine-grained beak behavior inference, thereby reducing the conflict between global localization and local feature extraction. In addition, a Near-Online Trajectory Stitcher is proposed to reconnect fragmented tracklets using unified temporal, spatial, scale, and directional constraints induced by platform movement. Experiments on practical inspection datasets demonstrated robust tracking continuity and stable quantification performance. Compared with state-of-the-art frameworks, the proposed method reduced identity switches from 10 to 4 and improved IDF1 by 2.43%, while minimizing counting errors across diverse detector architectures. With TensorRT acceleration and multi-stream parallel processing on the Jetson Orin NX, system throughput increased from 7.89 FPS to 51.43 FPS without compromising accuracy. Overall, this work provides a practical solution for quantitative heat stress assessment and supports the deployment of physiological state monitoring systems for precision livestock farming.

This study evaluated dietary sterol-rich yeast hydrolysate (SYH) at 0, 0.2, 0.5, and 0.8 g/kg in 720 yellow-feathered broiler breeder hens for 6 weeks. The tested SYH, supplied as a powder, contained 9.24% mannan, 3.1% total sterols, 2.0% amino nitrogen, and 3.64 g/kg nucleotides. Serum lipoproteins, intestinal morphology, digestive enzyme activities, barrier-related gene expression, and cecal microbiota were assessed. Low-density lipoprotein cholesterol was higher in J-C than in Control, J-A, and J-B, whereas high-density lipoprotein cholesterol did not differ among treatments. Duodenal lipase showed a significant overall treatment effect, but no Dunn-Holm pairwise comparison remained significant; ileal lipase was higher in J-C than in J-A. For barrier-related transcripts, J-A had higher ZO-1 than the Control and J-B and higher occludin and claudin-1 than all other groups, whereas MUC2 was higher in J-A and J-C than in the Control. These transcript changes are consistent with the modulation of molecular components associated with intestinal barrier integrity, but they do not by themselves demonstrate improved barrier function. Intestinal morphology showed selective, segment-specific differences rather than a consistent dose-related pattern. Alpha diversity did not differ, whereas Bray-Curtis PERMANOVA detected an overall difference among treatments (p = 0.017) despite overlapping PCoA distributions. Pairwise differential-abundance analysis using metagenomeSeq identified six family- or genus-level differences after false-discovery-rate correction, but these were specific to individual pairwise comparisons and showed no monotonic dose pattern. No exploratory microbiota-phenotype correlation remained significant after multiple-testing correction. Overall, SYH elicited inclusion-level- and trait-specific responses rather than a coordinated improvement across endpoints; therefore, the present data do not identify a single optimal inclusion level.

IntroductionThis study investigated the effects of slightly acidic electrolyzed water (SAEW) on the gut morphology and microbiota structure in early weaned piglets.MethodsA total of 144 healthy Large White × Landrace × Duroc weaned piglets (21 days old, sex in half, each weighing 7.0 ± 0.5 kg) were randomly assigned into three groups. Each group included four replicates, with each replicate comprising 12 piglets. The weaned piglets in the control (CON) group drank only disinfected tap water. Those in experimental groups I and II were given SAEW with available chlorine concentrations (ACCs) of 0.3 and 0.6 mg/L, respectively. The formal experimental period was 15 days.ResultsThe results showed that the weight and the length of the intestines of the piglets in the SAEW I and II groups significantly increased compared with those in the CON group. In the jejunum, the villus height of the SAEW II group significantly increased by 13.1% compared with the CON group (p < 0.05). In the ileum, the villus heights of the SAEW I and II groups significantly increased compared with the CON group (p < 0.05). The villus height/crypt depth ratio of the two experimental groups significantly increased compared with that of the CON group (p < 0.05). No significant changes were observed in the gut microbial diversity. However, the relative abundance (RA) of Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, and Actinobacteria increased compared with the CON group (p < 0.05). The RA of Firmicutes in the duodenum, jejunum, ileum, and cecum of piglets significantly decreased in the SAEW I and II groups. At the genus level, the RA of Lactobacillus decreased (p < 0.05), while that of Streptococcus, Prevotella, and Eubacterium increased (p < 0.05).DiscussionIn conclusion, drinking SAEW significantly improves the intestinal development and the morphological structure of piglets and significantly promotes the colonization of the Streptococcus, Prevotella, and Eubacterium flora in the intestinal tract, but reduces the abundance of Lactobacillus in the small intestine. This might be related to the alteration of the intestinal pH value by SAEW. The application effects of more SAEW concentrations require further experimental research.

In recent years, employing an auxiliary heat source, combined with residual heat from chicken house ventilation, to dry chicken manure has emerged as a novel manure treatment method. This method uses residual heat from chicken house ventilation in the early drying stage and an auxiliary heat source in the late drying stage, resulting in a variable temperature process. Nevertheless, limited research has been conducted on the variable drying process of chicken manure, and no standard currently exists for setting the drying parameters. To investigate the variable temperature drying process of chicken manure, this study set up a simulated drying system. First, the effects of drying temperature (45–65 °C), air velocity (0.6–1.8 m/s), and moisture content nodes (35–55%) on drying time, energy consumption, and total nitrogen loss were investigated using single-factor experiments. Then, an orthogonal experiment was performed to analyze the comprehensive impact of different influencing factors. Finally, the drying effect was evaluated using a multi-indicator comprehensive scoring method, and the drying parameters were optimized through a combination of orthogonal and single-factor experiments. The results showed that the drying temperature during the second stage had a significant effect on chicken manure drying performance under the variable temperature process (p < 0.05), while the moisture content nodes and air velocity yielded no significant effect (p > 0.05). In actual production, the following optimal parameters are recommended—drying temperature in the second stage: 57.5 °C, air velocity: 1.2–1.5 m/s, and moisture content nodes: 45–50%.

Accurate, real-time, and cost-effective detection and counting of pre-weaning piglets are critical for improving piglet survival rates. However, achieving this remains technically challenging due to high computational demands, frequent occlusion, social behaviors, and cluttered backgrounds in commercial farming environments. To address these challenges, this study proposes a lightweight and attention-enhanced piglet detection and counting network based on an improved YOLOv8n architecture. The design includes three key innovations: (i) the standard C2f modules in the backbone were replaced with an efficient novel Multi-Scale Spatial Pyramid Attention (MSPA) module to enhance the multi-scale feature representation while a maintaining low computational cost; (ii) an improved Gather-and-Distribute (GD) mechanism was incorporated into the neck to facilitate feature fusion and accelerate inference; and (iii) the detection head and the sample assignment strategy were optimized to align the classification and localization tasks better, thereby improving the overall performance. Experiments on the custom dataset demonstrated the model’s superiority over state-of-the-art counterparts, achieving 88.5% precision and a 93.8% mAP0.5. Furthermore, ablation studies showed that the model reduced the parameters, floating point operations (FLOPs), and model size by 58.45%, 46.91% and 56.45% compared to those of the baseline YOLOv8n, respectively, while achieving a 2.6% improvement in the detection precision and a 4.41% reduction in the counting MAE. The trained model was deployed on a Raspberry Pi 4B with ncnn to verify the effectiveness of the lightweight design, reaching an average inference speed of <87 ms per image. These findings confirm that the proposed method offers a practical, scalable solution for intelligent pig farming, combining a high accuracy, efficiency, and real-time performance in resource-limited environments.

Slightly acidic electrolyzed water (SAEW) as a disinfectant might be ingested by humans and animals along with food and drinking water. The present study explored whether adding SAEW to drinking water affects the drinking water intake, food intake, body weight, intestinal morphology, digestive enzyme activity, and antioxidant enzyme activity of mice. This will provide a theoretical basis for the biosafety of SAEW as a food and drinking water disinfectant. The present study selected and randomly divided 96 4-week-old Kunming mice into three groups: control, 0.5 mg/L SAEW, and 5.0 mg/L SAEW groups. The experiment lasted 60 days. The present study showed that drinking SAEW had no noticeable effect on the food intake, water intake, body weight, and blood biochemical indexes of mice. SAEW significantly increased the plasma superoxide dismutase inhibition rate, glutathione content, and total antioxidant capacity of mice (p < 0.05). The fructose-6-phosphate kinase, isocitrate dehydrogenase, and malate dehydrogenase activities of mice in the SAEW group were significantly increased. Furthermore, SAEW promoted the morphological development of the small intestine and increased the activities of amylase, lipase, and protease. Therefore, the 0.5 and 5.0 mg/L SAEW was beneficial for mice, and improved the body’s antioxidative, glucose-metabolizing, and digestive ability.

There is an urgent need for accurate measurement for emissions of ammonia (NH3) and hydrogen sulfide (H2S) in dairy barns in order to obtain reliable emission inventories and to develop and evaluate abatement strategies. This experiment was performed on three dairy farms in central China during 14 consecutive days in the winter 2020. Concentrations of NH3 and H2S were measured every two hours. The samples were taken inside and outside of barns from 7 sites at two heights (at floor and 1.5 over the floor). The results show that the average NH3 concentration was 2.47 mg/m3 with a maximum of 4.62 mg/m3, while the average H2S concentration was 0.179 mg/m3 with a maximum of 0.246 mg/m3. Lactating cows produced significantly more NH3 (3.73 mg/m3 versus 2.34 mg/m3) and H2S (0.24 mg/m3 versus 0.14 mg/m3) than non-lactating cows. NH3 and H2S concentrations were higher at 0 m than at 1.5 m, especially during the day. In addition, the average daily emission rates per animal unit (AU = 500 kg weight) were 23.5 g and 0.21 g for NH3 and H2S, respectively. The emission rate for NH3 was then used to extrapolate the NH3 emission from the Chinese dairy production. Our estimation for 2016 was 0.45 Tg, and it could reach 1.35 Tg by 2050. These numbers reflected our first attempt to calculate emission inventories for the Chinese dairy industry. Our results also suggest that more concrete measures must be taken to reduce the uncertainties of NH3 emissions from dairy cow production in China.

利用鸡舍换气余热干燥鸡粪是近年来发展起来的新型鸡粪处理方法,其利用鸡舍通风换气时所排废气的余热对鸡粪进行干燥,不仅能对鸡舍通风排出的废气进行再利用,还能对鸡粪进行有效的脱水处理.文章介绍了鸡舍换气余热干燥鸡粪技术的工作原理、特点及近几年来国内外该技术的研究与应用进展,总结了目前鸡舍换气余热干燥鸡粪技术在国内应用时遇到的干燥速率低和氨排放高等问题,分析了国内外在应对夏季鸡舍排风湿度高、梅雨季节、连续阴雨天和冬季气温较低情况下利用辅助热源提高干燥速率的方法和存在的不足之处,并基于节约能源和减少空气污染的原则,对鸡舍换气余热干燥鸡粪设备的优化提出了相关建议.

为探索适合的鸡舍内消毒方式,试验采用有效氯浓度范围为90～100mg/L的微酸性电解水对商品蛋鸡舍进行喷雾消毒,比较鸡舍部分消毒(仅地面和墙面喷雾消毒)与整舍消毒对空气中微生物浓度的消杀效果.结果显示:在同一鸡舍整舍喷雾消毒,空气中细菌和真菌的杀菌率波动范围分别为26.2％～49.6％和33.3％～58.6％,地面和墙面喷雾消毒空气中细菌和真菌杀菌率波动范围分别为23.5％～44.3％和36.6％～53.2％.在两种消毒方式消毒前1 h空气中细菌和真菌浓度相似的条件下,整舍喷雾消毒后空气中细菌浓度略低于地面和墙面喷雾消毒后空气中细菌浓度(P＜0.05),两种方式消毒后空气中真菌浓度差异不显著(P＞0.05).结果表明,采用有效氯浓度范围为90～100 mg/L的微酸性电解水对鸡舍地面和墙面喷雾消毒可取得与整舍喷雾消毒相似的消杀效果,该结果有助于实现鸡舍精准消毒,改善现有带鸡消毒模式.

With the rapid development of large-scale and intensive swine production, the emission of aerosols from swine farms has become a growing concern, attracting extensive attention. While aerosols are found in various environments, those from swine farms are distinguished from human habitats, such as residential, suburban, and urban areas. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of aerosols from swine farms, this paper reviewed relevant studies conducted between 2000 and 2022. The main components, concentrations, and size distribution of the aerosols were systematically reviewed. The differences between aerosols from swine farms and human living and working environments were compared. Finally, the sources, influencing factors, and reduction technologies for aerosols from swine farms were thoroughly elucidated. The results demonstrated that the concentrations of aerosols inside swine farms varied considerably, and most exceeded safety thresholds. However, further exploration is needed to fully understand the difference in airborne microorganism community structure and particles with small sizes (<1 μm) between swine farms and human living and working environments. More airborne bacterial and viruses were adhered to large particles in swine houses, while the proportion of airborne fungi in the respirable fraction was similar to that of human living and working environments. In addition, swine farms have a higher abundance and diversity of potential pathogens, airborne resistant microorganisms and resistant genes compared to the human living and working environments. The aerosols of swine farms mainly originated from sources such as manure, feed, swine hair and skin, secondary production, and waste treatment. According to the source analysis and factors influencing aerosols in swine farms, various technologies could be employed to mitigate aerosol emissions, and some end-of-pipe technologies need to be further improved before they are widely applied. Swine farms are advised not to increase aerosol concentration in human living and working environments, in order to decrease the impact of aerosols from swine farms on human health and restrain the spread of airborne potential pathogens. This review provides critical insights into aerosols of swine farms, offering guidance for taking appropriate measures to enhance air quality inside and surrounding swine farms.

Drying chicken manure with exhaust air from a chicken house is a new manure management method developed in recent years. The majority of the heat for this drying method comes from the waste heat of ventilation in a poultry house or ambient air, so the drying process is carried out at a low temperature. When met with continuous rain or when the wet curtain in the chicken house is turned on, the relative humidity of the exhaust air from the chicken house will rise to high levels, and the drying process will be under the condition of high relative humidity. In order to explore the low-temperature drying characteristics of chicken manure in a humid environment, drying experiments were carried out in an experimental cross-flow drying system. The experiment mainly studied the effect of process parameters such as drying temperature, air velocity, and manure layer thickness on the low-temperature drying characteristics of chicken manure in a humid environment. The results showed that the low-temperature drying process of chicken manure in a humid environment only had a falling rate period, with no accelerated or constant rate period. Additionally, five common thin-layer drying models (Lewis model, Page model, Henderson and Pabis model, Wang and Singh model, and Exponential model) were applied to simulate the performance of the manure drying process. The exponential model was considered to be more suitable for describing the low temperature drying process in a humid environment, and the effective diffusivity changed between 6.37 × 10−7 and 2.17 × 10−6 m2/h.

Ammonia (NH3) is a major air pollutant. However, few studies have been extended beyond the histopathological changes in the olfactory mucosa to the impact of NH3 exposure on other parts of the olfactory system and olfactory functioning. Therefore, we assessed the effects of exogenous NH3 (either 20 ppm for the low exposure group or 200 ppm for the high exposure group) on the various parts of the olfactory system by histological observation, gene expression, immunochemistry, and chemical analyses. A total of 140 Institute of Cancer Research mice (4 weeks old), 70 females and 70 males (average body weight at the start: 21.5 ± 1.9 g), were used. The exposure lasted for 4 weeks, and the mice were exposed to the NH3 for 4 h per day. Our results showed that chronic exposure to NH3 damaged the olfactory system, with consequences for changing the foraging behavior and anxiety behavior. Our results also suggest that it is plausible that NH3 recruited T cells and activated microglia cells and astrocytes, leading to inflammation in the olfactory system. Increased release of proinflammatory cytokines (TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6, and interferon-γ) and reduced release of anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-4 and IFN-beta) led to tissue damage and compromised the functions of the olfactory system.

目的 为了更好地弄清楚小组抽签比拼对《创业基础》"积分制-score"教学的影响,衡量教师教和学生学的教学效果.方法 采取小组抽签、设计试验组和对照组,通过破冰、奖励惩罚项目积分,结果分析讨论等方法研究实施该项目.设计试验班和对照班,2020A专业02班试验班实施小组抽签比拼,分8个重复,合计55人,2020B专业02班对照班不实施小组抽签比拼,8个重复,合计49人,共计104人,通过破冰、分组、建立小组抽签比拼,研究其对试验班和对照班"平时积分""实践课积分"和"创业计划书积分"三个教学环节的影响.结果(1)在"平时积分"授课环节中,"问题互动""参与讨论""微信好友数增加""公众号浏览""抖音浏览"5个观测变量,随着周序的增加,试验班积分呈现明显增加趋势,总评积分极显著递增(P<0.01);(2)平时积分环节"总评"试验班比对照班积分极显著增加(P<0.01);(3)在"实践课积分"和"创业计划书积分"两个授课环节中,"总评"试验班比对照班积分极显著增加(P<0.01).结论 应用型本科《创业基础》"积分制-score"教学中,采用小组抽签比拼方法能够激发学生的主观能动性,提升学生学习兴趣,固化创新精神,促进了大学生创业就业全面发展.

地方综合性大学涉农专业应用型人才培养中校企协同育人越来越受到重视,因此,本研究探索了产教融合下校企协同构建"校企合作、多维互动、分段递进"的应用型人才培养机制.本研究还建立并完善了以专业技能培养为核心,以创新创业能力成长为主线,通过产教深度融合途径探究"两个体系、两个保障机制"的改革措施.最终,形成了校企协同的应用型人才全程培育模式.这一研究成果提升了育人效果,满足区域现代农业发展对应用型人才的需求.

为了在家畜环境卫生学教学中进行课程思政教育,提出了课程思政的建设思路,构建了家畜环境卫生学课程思政的内容体系,搭建了课程思政的教学平台,构建了全新的教学模式和全过程评价体系,在教学过程中开展了课程思政教学活动.结果表明,开展课程思政教学活动能明显提高课堂教学质量和人才培养质量.

在新旧动能转换的关键时期,农业发展在我国实现"两个一百年"目标中占有重要的地位,但是地方高校传统涉农专业的人才培养滞后于行业发展.为使涉农专业人才培养更好地适应经济社会和农业现代化进程,着力构建以学生为中心、双创能力培养为切入点的两大体系和"三个结合、八链对接"的协同育人模式,形成新形势下涉农专业"四位一体·岗位导向"的双创课程体系,完善"多元协同·能力递进"的实践教学体系,提升与双创教育相适应的教学手段,组建适应双创教育的"双师·双创导师·行业企业导师"的教师团队,建立校企协同"四主体·动态循环"的双创人才培养评价体系,加强双创意识与能力的培养,较好地解决涉农专业人才培养与区域经济发展需求相协调与适应的问题.

本文通过构建地方综合性大学动物科学专业创新型人才培养机制,探索了新农科背景下校企深度融合共建"校企合作、多维互动、分段递进"的创新人才培养模式;建立了以"综合职业素质能力"提升为中心,通过产教深度融合途径探究"五个体系"改革措施;形成了校企共建应用型人才全程育人机制,保障育人效果,满足区域行业发展的创新型人才需求.