Approaches to Precision Animal Feed Production using Hyperspectral Imaging and Computational Intelligence

( Daniel Dooyum Uyeh ),( Yushin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2019 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.24 No.2

A resilient animal industry will require cost-effective feed rations as feed accounts for between 60 to 80% of production costs. Owing to the complexities in feed formulation, software programs are of benefit in ensuring accurate nutrient compositions with selections of cost-efficient materials. However, requirements of specialized techniques for users, high computing power needs, and lack of user-software interactivity for optimizing results, for example, limit current feed formulation software use. Researchers have been exploring the possibility of using food industry and agricultural by-products, and food waste in feed formulation with the benefits of reducing feed deficits and costs. The nutrient profiles of by-products and food wastes, however, are highly variable due to inconsistency in sources and extraction methods. To address these gaps, software and hyperspectral imaging models were developed. Subsequently, the developed systems were integrated into existing ones to propose two models for precision livestock feed production.

Assessment of sterilization methods on by-products used in TMR for safe feed production

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Seung Min Woo ),( Md. Kamruzzaman ),( Yu Shin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2016 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.21 No.2

Breeding livestock is becoming more expensive by the day due to high dependence on grains for feeding and a continuous fluctuation in price of grains. This has led to several studies to find alternative feed for livestock farms. Formulating TMR feed with by-products via fermentation using effective microbes as facilitators has been in consideration lately for it`s efficiency, cheap cost, etc. These by-products includes mushroom, soybean curd cake, rice bran, distillers dried grains, wheat bran, palm kernel expeller, cotton seed meals, corn starch cake, soy sauce cake etc. However during this process, unwanted microbes from the handling process and the normal micro flora usually associated with by-products used in this formulation competes with the effective microbes that are supposed to act on the by-products. The growth of the contaminant organism in the TMR using by-products leads to deterioration of the feed. This study focused on establishing an efficient fermentation and packaging protocol for a safe by-product feed by conducting analyses exploiting different sterilization protocols. Results indicated mixed by-products in this study contains Bacillus spp. and an effective microbe; lactic acid bacteria in the control. Steam sterilization reduced the cells of Bacillus spp. to less than 106 at the different treatment conditions whereas UV did not. Results of this study will help in production of safe and efficient feed at a low cost as primary consideration and design parameters for development of a smart tank with by-product feed sterilizer as a component as secondary consideration.

Optimal robot utilization in protected cultivation systems

( Daniel Dooyum Uyeh ),( Rammohan Mallipeddi ),( Tusan Park ),( Hyunggyu Park ),( Yeongsu Kim ),( Seokho Kang ),( Junhee Kim ),( Yushin Ha ),( Seungmin Woo ) 한국농업기계학회 2020 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.25 No.2

There is growing demand for premium and safe agricultural products. Greenhouses and plant factories which are types of protected cultivation system are being adopted to meet demand. This is because of ease in regulating the climate required for optimal plant growth which can facilitate year-round cultivation of these agriculture products and many other numerous benefits. However, poor ventilation in greenhouses can be harmful to the human workforce. This has led to the development of robots for hazardous tasks. However, mobile robots are required to navigate down every aisle to perform a task in a greenhouse, and it is difficult to predict at which point the robot will need to return to the start point, to offload or refill for transportation and spraying schedules, respectively or battery charges. This necessitates optimal scheduling of robots. In this study, we formulated the robot scheduling problem and adopted and tunned an evolutionary algorithm to solve this problem using MATLAB software. We performed simulations of different robot working scenarios integrating various parameters. Different scheduling scenarios showed varied patterns. Initial state of charge of the robot batteries impacted the working state of the robots. For examples, where the robots had fixed rates of charge and discharge of 5%, there were also more continuously working hours of robots in the two studied cases. A system for optimal scheduling of robots in a greenhouse to maximize the total work hours and sustain continuous operation was developed and proposed.

Trends in Automation and Robotics in Protected Horticulture

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Senorpe Asem-hiablie ),( Tusan Park ),( Seungmin Woo ),( Hoseo Lee ),( Junhee Kim ),( Yushin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.2

Changes in climate and associated negative impacts on production agriculture have increased the focus on adaptation strategies including protected cultivation systems. Incorporation of automation and robotics in such systems provide additional benefits such as reduced exposures to chemicals that are harmful to human operators in these enclosed structures. Also, environmentally-friendly practices such as precision weed control which reduce the use of chemicals are made possible by machine vision. Moreover, automation provides opportunities for improved positioning in the global market through increased production. In addition to a review of published reports on automation and control in production systems, five state-of-the-art greenhouses and a major international industry exhibition were visited in order to examine trends in protected cultivation. Data on automation systems and production outputs were collected and analyzed. Our findings show that important gains have been made recently including substantial progress in the development of robots for protected cultivation in greenhouses. For example, 5,000 kg/ha of paprika with 1,500,000 growth lines was cultivated in a state-of-the-art greenhouse using a workforce of 50 personnel compared to 2500 kg/ha in the open field with a considerably higher labor force. This represented a 50% increase in production per square meter and indicates some of the opportunities presented by protected cultivation in meeting growing demands without increasing areas under cultivation. Greenhouse cultivation could be a major driver in attaining food security especially in countries most susceptible to changes in climate. There is a need therefore for improvements in systems as well as the development of relatively affordable technology to facilitate automation.

Precision Livestock Feed Production Using Dynamic Approaches

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Rammohan Mallipeddi ),( Trinadh Pamulapati ),( Tusan Park ),( Seungmin Woo ),( Junhee Kim ),( Yushin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2018 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.23 No.2

Increasing human populations are leading to increasing and sometimes conflicting demands on land and resources. Agriculture, particularly the livestock industry will need to increase productivity using existing or fewer resources to meet demands. A resilient livestock industry will require cost-effective feed rations as feed accounts for between 60 to 80% of production costs. Techniques in computational intelligence were used in coding and fine-tuning algorithms for feed formulation. Simulations were done in MATLAB to evaluate the performance of the algorithms. Hyperspectral imaging and near infrared spectroscopy were used to acquire spectral data from mixed by-products and packaged feed. Preprocessing methods such as second derivative and normalization were applied to the data to remove noise. Data was acquired from a spectral range of 900 to 2100 nm. Prediction tools (Partial least square regression and Unscrambler) were used to build amino acids, sugars, organic acids and moisture content models. This presents rapid, non-destructive measurements with no sample preparation and high sensitivity. All the models had satisfactory R² values. Subsequently, the developed systems were combined with existing systems to propose models for precision livestock feed production.

Greenhouse layout optimization enhances safe and rapid robot navigation

( Daniel Dooyum Uyeh ),( Rammohan Mallipeddi ),( Tusan Park ),( Junhee Kim ),( Yeongsu Kim ),( Seokho Kang ),( Yushin Ha ),( Seungmin Woo ) 한국농업기계학회 2020 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.25 No.1

Protected systems such as greenhouses provides opportunities such as increasing production and ease in environmental regulation required for optimal plant growth. However, problems such as poor ventilation in greenhouses can be fatal to the human workforce. This has led to research to develop robots for hazardous tasks. It is difficult to predict at which point a robot will need to return to the start point; to offload or refill for transportation and spraying schedules respectively or charge the battery for all category of robots. It will be commercially constraining to manufacture robots for every greenhouse specification. this study, greenhouse layout optimization problem was formulated to find optimal points on each bed to create an access path that would enable reduction in travel time from any point in the greenhouse to the base point. The optimization problem was solved using Differential Evolution (DE), an Evolutionary Algorithm. The system considers - a) required space for inter-bed and rotary robot navigation b) standard bed specification, c) area of the greenhouse, d) base point for robot starting and termination. The above parameters can be changed to user preference.

Optimization of Total Mixed Ration (TMR) feed formulation for Cattle Using Evolutionary Systems

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Rammohan Mallipeddi ),( Trinadh Pamulapati ),( Tusan Park ),( Junhee Kim ),( Seungmin Woo ),( Yushin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2017 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.22 No.2

Different food products obtained from cattle are important sources of nutrients to humans worldwide. About 60~80% of production cost is incurred by animal feed which is dependent on the class and phase of the animal. This is a non-deterministic polynomial-time hardness (NP-hard) recurrent problem due to the existence of both linear and non-linear constraints. For most programming tools, satisfying constraints at specific stages of breeding are often not possible. This entails the advancement of a program that has an intrinsic mechanism to allow easing of constraints based on the necessities of it's users. Consequently, the formulation of the problem and system of optimization should facilitate this. We modified the conventional formulations using parameters that allows tolerance that accommodate constraints slackening and proposed a method exploring evolutionary systems. Results of our experimental trials indicated that easing requirements has direct connections with the cost and in some instances quantity of the feed. We propose a system which possesses the capability to explore for a feasible and least cost result if available or the best solution if otherwise and find the suitable components to be used in the formulation.

Appraisal of thin layer drying rate of parboiled rice applying different Mathematical models

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Seung Min Woo ),( Md. Kamruzzaman ),( Yu Shin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2016 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.21 No.2

Rice is a staple food for more than half of the World`s population. A lot of post-harvest losses is currently accrued due to less understanding of drying rate by most rice processors especially in developing countries. These includes moisture content where high temperature drying should be stopped, tempering should be done, gentle drying to milling moisture content, etc. A proper understanding of drying rate of rice will go a long way in solving a lot of issues involved with drying of this grain. This study treated Japonica rice with initial moisture content of 14.3% using the parboiling method. This increased the moisture content to a final moisture content after treatment of 28.3%. With the use of a circulatory drying oven, this study determined the reduction in drying weight in real time using Aduino software. Different selected empirical models were then used to simulate tests of thin layer drying data at the optimal temperature of drying rice. Appraisal of the mixt mathematical models using the F-Statistic showed that modified Henderson & Pabis`s (MR= A exp [Bt] + C exp [-Dt] + E exp [Ft]) and Henderson & Pabis`s (MR = A exp [Bt]) as the best models with value of 5944.54 and 4548.64 respectively. amongst all the tested empirical models, Two-term expotential (MR = A exp [Bt] + [1 - A] exp a exp [Bat]) had the least F-statistic value of 26.47. Analysis of data showed constant drying rate to occur between 0-250 minutes with the best models. The best empirical equations enabled writing of mathematical expressions for the drying rate and time.

A HACCP model for By-products feed production

( Uyeh Daniel Dooyum ),( Seung Min Woo ),( Jun Hee Kim ),( Dong Hyun Lee ),( Yu Shin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2017 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.22 No.1

By-products has been considered lately in Total Mixed Ration (TMR) as an alternative to livestock feed around the world. This is due to the high cost of using forage as feed, less expense in exploring by-products of agriculture origin and environmental concerns with their disposal. However, by-products usually contain contaminants and the production process requires fermentation using a storage and fermentation tank. Animal feed is the start point of the food safety chain in the `farm-to-fork` model. This necessitated a study to model a protocol that will culminate to safe feed production. Hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP), a systematic preventive approach to food safety from biological, chemical and physical hazards in production processes that can cause the finished product to be unsafe was explored. Implementation of this model provides a mechanism that ensures product safety is continuously achieved. The entire production process of By-products feed production was evaluated using HACCP wizard software. This includes the plant layout, technical standards, storage and fermentation tank cleansing method, staff assignment, safety control method, and distribution. The potential biological, chemical, and physical hazards that may exist in every step of the production process were identified, and then critical control points (CCPs) were selected. This will ensure the safety of products made from livestock that consumes by-product feed. These includes cheese, milk, beef, etc.

Variations in components of feed materials for livestock production

( Daniel Dooyum Uyeh ),( Yeongsu Kim ),( Hyuntak Kim ),( Seungmin Woo ),( Seohkho Kang ),( Hyunggyu Park ),( Yonggik Kim ),( Yushin Ha ) 한국농업기계학회 2022 한국농업기계학회 학술발표논문집 Vol.27 No.1

The local and global demand for livestock products such as milk, beef, and cheese is recorded. This trend is projected to double by 2050 compared to the 2012 levels. Various factors could be attributed to this trend, such as the demand for foods that are rich in protein content. Up to 33% of the protein and 17% of the global kilocalorie intake is currently supplied by the livestock sector for the global human population, which is currently at 7.2 billion people. Improved standards of living and changes in social habits are other reasons. Feed, which accounts for 60 to 80% of the production cost, is a major expense in livestock production. Research has been focused on cost-effective and sustainable feed production over the years. A sustainable livestock industry would heavily rely on precision in feed production, which is vital. In this study, we examined the extent of variation in nutrient composition of feed materials by examining the materials for; a) variation within livestock feed factories; b) similar materials amongst different livestock feed factories; and c) finished livestock feed and the labeled content. Results showed a significant variation of up to 20% in the nutrient content of the livestock feed materials and the finished livestock feed. This variation could cause serious adverse effects on the productivity of the animals and the cost of breeding.