**Animal and Veterinary Sciences**
Animal and Veterinary Sciences - DI4A

Farming and Environmental Engineering

Cluster

Animal and Veterinary Sciences (SAV)

Description

The research group operates within the general scope of the scientific sector AGRI-04/C (Rural Buildings and Agro-Forestry Land Management) and AGRI-04/B (Agricultural Mechanics), focusing specifically on the following research areas:

Emissions from farming and aquaculture activities: quantification and mitigation of livestock effluents, noxious/pollutant gases, and odor emissions.
Effluent and digestate treatment systems: design and optimization of technologies aimed at reducing environmental impact, including solid-liquid separation, membrane filtration, drying, vacuum evaporation, and innovative composting systems as well as nitrification/denitrification plants.

Biogas plants: development and analysis of anaerobic digestion systems for livestock effluents (including aquaculture waste), agricultural biomass and agro-industrial by-products.
Biomethane potential (BMP) assessment: Evaluation and characterization of the methane yield of various livestock and agricultural biomasses.

Barn automation and management: automated housing cleaning systems.
Precision feeding: automatic feeding systems (AFS) for dairy and beef cattle herds.
Climate control automation: Automation of ventilation and cooling systems.

Microclimate and indoor air quality: characterization and continuous monitoring of the housing microclimate and indoor air parameters, focusing on the concentration and emission rates of noxious gases, particulate matter (dust), and bioaerosols.
Housing climate control systems: engineering and optimization of mechanical ventilation, heating, and cooling systems.
Heat stress mitigation: implementation of cooling systems to mitigate heat stress in dairy barns.

Research subjects

Precision Livestock Farming systems in animal farms - Equipment for milking, feeding, climatization and manure management
Anaerobic digestion of animal manure, agricultural waste and by-products
Digestate and manure treatment from animal farms and aquacultural systems
Technical systems for heat stress reduction in animal farms
Environmental sustainability and energy savings of intensive fish farming

ERC panels

LS9 Biotechnology and Biosystems Engineering: Biotechnology using all organisms, biotechnology for environment and food applications, applied plant and animal sciences, bioengineering and synthetic biology, biomass and biofuels, biohazards
LS9_10 Veterinary and applied animal sciences
LS9_7 Environmental biotechnology and bioengineering
SH7_5 Sustainability sciences, environment and resources, ecosystem services