RT Journal Article
T1 Early Detection of Infection in Pigs through an Online Monitoring System
A1 Martínez Avilés, Marta
A1 Fernández Carrión, Eduardo
A1 López García-Baones, J. M.
A1 Sánchez-Vizcaíno Rodríguez, José Manuel
AB Late detection of emergency diseases causes significant economic losses for pig producers and governments. As the first signs of animal infection are usually fever and reduced motion that lead to reduced consumption of water and feed, we developed a novel smart system to monitor body temperature and motion in real time, facilitating the early detection of infectious diseases. In this study, carried out within the framework of the European Union research project Rapidia Field, we tested the smart system on 10 pigs experimentally infected with two doses of an attenuated strain of African swine fever. Biosensors and an accelerometer embedded in an eartag captured data before and after infection, and video cameras were used to monitor the animals 24 h per day. The results showed that in 8 of 9 cases, the monitoring system detected infection onset as an increase in body temperature and decrease in movement before or simultaneously with fever detection based on rectal temperature measurement, observation of clinical signs, the decrease in water consumption or positive qPCR detection of virus. In addition, this decrease in movement was reliably detected using automatic analysis of video images therefore providing an inexpensive alternative to direct motion measurement. The system can be set up to alert staff when high fever, reduced motion or both are detected in one or more animals. This system may be useful for monitoring sentinel herds in real time, considerably reducing the financial and logistical costs of periodic sampling and increasing the chances of early detection of infection.
SN 18651674
YR 2015
FD 2015
LK https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/35478
UL https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/35478
LA eng
NO Unión Europea. FP7
DS Docta Complutense
RD 11 abr 2025