Development of a solid-state lighting system with a specific dynamic light source for layer poultry

• Grant number: 20/09523-0
• Support Opportunities: Research Grants - Innovative Research in Small Business - PIPE
• Duration: March 01, 2021 - February 28, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Agricultural Engineering - Rural Buildings and Ambience
• Principal Investigator: Hugo Vasconcelos
• Grantee: Hugo Vasconcelos
• Host Company: Audax Electronics Ltda
• CNAE: Fabricação de componentes eletrônicos ; Fabricação de lâmpadas e outros equipamentos de iluminação ; Fabricação de equipamentos e aparelhos elétricos não especificados anteriormente
• City: São Bernardo do Campo
• Pesquisadores principais: Juliana de Souza Granja Barros

Abstract

Laying poultry has significant economic and social representativeness in Brazilian agriculture - generating food, jobs and wealth for the country, with increased production and consumption of eggs in recent years. The spectrum of light exerts a strong influence on laying hens and, when applied of correct form, can result in improvements in the development, behavior, and productivity of birds. Usually, aviaries are illuminated with systems adapted to humans, and laying hens have different spectrums and illuminance needs. The photopic curve of laying hens presents energy peaks different from humans, mainly in the ultraviolet, yellow and red bands. Thus, a lighting system with a specific spectrum curve to meet the needs of laying hens in the laying phase, encompassing all wavelengths of the visible laying hens, can provide better productive performance, egg quality, and behavior to laying hens. Also, laying hens have different lighting needs throughout their life. In the breeding and rearing phase, lights with a color temperature between 5000 and 6500 K are usually used, which privileges the cool colors (blue and green). In the laying phase, the light spectrum used is the one that has the most energy in the warm colors (yellow and red), which are the lights with color temperature from 2700 to 3000 K. Thus, a dynamic lighting system, which allows the adjustment of different spectrum curves in the same luminaire, could be used in the different stages of production of the commercial posture and even in other types of production, as in the rearing of broilers. Such characteristics can give robustness to lighting systems, representing an unprecedented technological innovation. Based on this, the main of this project will be to develop a dynamic solid-state lighting system that provides illumination and light spectrum specific to the needs of laying hens in the laying phase, and that allows increased productivity, improvement in egg quality, bird welfare and electricity savings. Therefore, the research will be divided into three stages: development of prototypes of the specific dynamic lighting system for laying hens; tests of prototypes in experiments with laying hens in a controlled environment and validation of the final prototype in an experiment conducted in a posture aviary. In the first stage, two luminous spectrum curves will be constructed based on the photopic curve of laying hens and information from scientific research in the literature on the effect of light spectra on laying hens, which will be tested in step 2. These curves will be obtained through the use of the additive property of light combined with the generation of specific light at certain wavelengths. One of the main characteristics of the LED is to have the luminous flux proportional to the electric current; therefore, an arrangement of LEDs where each of them can be controlled individually through dedicated channels, combined with the additive property of light, allows the creation of a wide variety of light spectra seeking a unique spectrum for commercial posture. It is expected with this project to contribute to the development of a more improved, specific, and efficient lighting product for the application in poultry laying, which results in savings of electricity, long service life, increased feed productivity, improve egg quality, zootechnical performance and bird welfare. The main impacts that can be generated with this project are the use of a renewable and clean light source, without the addition of heavy metals or gases that harm nature and the reduction of disposal, because solid-state technology. In addition to considerably reducing the number of exchanges of sources, it is fully recyclable, which contributes to the reduction of disposal of products harmful to nature. (AU)