Evaluation of a technology platform utilizing Bluetooth low energy (BLE) beacons to measure movement of animals, assets and personnel throughout a pig production network
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1
Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health Business Unit, United States
Introduction
Within pig production systems many movements of pigs, semen, feed, supplies, assets and personnel occur on a daily basis– within farm sites, between farm sites, and among non-production sites (e.g., feed mills, truck washes, offices, warehouses). These movements inherently carry with them varying levels of disease agent transmission risk, with serious potential consequences on animal productivity and business performance.
The objective of this project was to evaluate an integrated measurement system to capture movement records of personnel and assets within and among sites to enable the more objective assessment of movement-related risks of disease introduction and transmission.
Materials and Methods
Production System Composition
A US production system and network was enrolled in the project. A schematic of the system’s pig flow is shown in Figure 1. The system is composed of six large sow farms and sells weaned pigs to grower customers. Sow Farm A is a closed-herd multiplier and produces replacement animals for the other five commercial sow farms. All semen is sourced from an external boar stud. The system also has a feed mill and truck wash.
pTrack System Architecture
The pTrack system is made up of the following system components (Figure 2):
• Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) Beacons – battery-powered devices that transmit BLE signals
o Location beacons – placed in physical locations
o Asset beacons – attached to physical assets
• Personnel Sensors – battery-powered devices carried by personnel, detect location and asset beacon BLE signals and transmit detection event data to a Gateway
• pTrack App – installed on Smart Phones of personnel, detect location and asset beacon BLE signals and transmit detection event data to Gateway
• Gateways – detect Sensors, receive data from Sensors, attach via Ethernet cable to Cellular Routers
• Cellular Router – attach to Gateways, transmit data to pTrack Cloud
• pTrack Cloud – receives data from Cellular Router, contains pTrack Web Dashboard and Control Panel (accessible via internet browser with User log-in credentials on PC, Laptop, Smart Phone)
pTrack Installation Process
At each animal production site, zones were first defined. For live animal housing space, each zone typically represents an entire barn or airspace for breeding, gestation and farrowing. For other areas of the farm, defined zones represented specific rooms and work areas.
Location beacons were then installed within each zone. Locations beacons were set to transmit a signal to a radius of 20 meters. The number of location beacons placed in each zone varied, depending on the length x width dimensions of the zone. Significant assets were tagged with asset beacons. Asset beacons were set to transmit a signal to a radius of five meters.
Sensor charging stations were installed in the office of each site. All system personnel received beacon sensors to wear while working each day. Cellular routers with attached gateways were installed in key sites locations. Signage displaying relevant messages and reminders were mounted in visible high-traffic locations within each site.
When a sensor comes within range of a gateway-router tandem, sensor-captured data is automatically transmitted to a cloud-based platform where data can be viewed and analytics done using available visualization components, dashboards and reports.
A risk level (0-10) was assigned to each zone-to-zone movement pair (Figure 3). The assigned risk level was selected based on the estimated risk of movements between two different zones related to their respective zone characteristics.
Examples of lower and higher risk movements are as follows:
• A movement from a gestation zone to a loadout chute zone was assigned a relatively lower risk
• A movement from an Isolation room to a gestation barn was assigned a relatively higher risk
When personnel carrying sensors come within range of a location beacon in a defined zone and remain within that zone for a specified period of time, the sensor detects the location beacon signals assigned to that zone and records the ID, date and time as a detection event for that zone. The time required for a sensor to record a detection event is a variable specified by the Administrator, and depends on where the zone and corresponding location beacons are located.
When personnel carrying sensors come within range of an asset beacon, the sensor detects the asset beacon signal and records the ID, date and time as a detection event. When personnel carrying sensors and beacon tagged assets enter within range of location beacons in a defined zone, the sensor records the asset-within-zone event.
Results and Discussion
Initial production network installation of the pTrack system began in mid-2018 and continues through 2019. As this is intended to be a multi-year pilot project, personnel and asset movements will continue to be recorded and evaluated on an ongoing basis. Also, updates and adjustments to hardware, software, risk levels and protocols will continue be made as necessary based on user feedback and project observation.
Figure 4 shows an example of two forms of personnel and asset movement visualization – movement arrows and a heat-map. Movement arrows indicate source (Sow Farm A office zone) to destination (farrowing and gestation zones) movements with the number of movements in the period displayed at the destination zone (tip of the arrow). The color of arrow corresponds to the assigned risk level for the respective zone-to-zone movements. The color of a destination zone on the heat map format corresponds to the number of movements in period being displayed, with “hotter” colors (e.g., red) indicating more movements than “cooler” colors (e.g., green).
Figure 5 is an example of a time-series chart of daily zone-to-zone personnel and asset movements. Figure 6 is an example of day-of-week and hour-of-day graphs. Within each day movement risk levels are displayed as a stacked bar for both Figures 5 and 6. With this being a preliminary evaluation of the first implementation of its kind with this technology platform, expected levels, ranges and distributions of movement risk values cannot yet be determined.
Figure 7 is an example of an origin zone-to-destination zone movement scatterplot. The color of the bubbles corresponds to the assigned zone-to-zone risk levels. The size of the bubbles corresponds to the number of movements for each respective zone-to-zone pairing.
These visuals can assist Users with identifying dates, times and locations of unexpected high-risk movements of assets and/or personnel. This knowledge can help production management staff better work with personnel to mitigate and manage disease transmission and circulation risks within and among sites for entire production networks.
As this production system network pilot project continues, hardware performance, software usefulness and personnel compliance will be assessed. Where improvements are needed, adjustments and modifications will be made.
Conclusions
This is a preliminary evaluation of the first production network-scale implementation of the pTrack technology in pig production. The pTrack system holds promise as a means for the simultaneous recording of various forms of relevant personnel and asset movements, offering the potential for improved understanding of disease introduction and circulation risks within and among sites across production networks. Further enhancements to the existing platform technology, as well as integration of additional technologies into the platform are planned. As this and any additional implementations progress, opportunities are expected to arise for assessing the platforms investigative contribution towards understanding the source(s) of disease agent introduction and continued circulation within and between farms.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to the pTrack crew who worked on the installation and ongoing work supporting the project. Also, thank you to the production system management for allowing this project to be conducted in their system, and to their many team members who are cooperating in the project.
Keywords:
movements,
risk,
ASSETS,
beacons,
Sensors
Conference:
GeoVet 2019. Novel spatio-temporal approaches in the era of Big Data, Davis, United States, 8 Oct - 10 Oct, 2019.
Presentation Type:
Senior oral presentation
Topic:
Emerging GIS, data science and sensor technologies adapted to animal, plant and human health, including precision medicine and precision farming
Citation:
Polson
D,
Bates
T,
Hartsook
G,
Lowe
E and
De Paz Solanes
X
(2019). Evaluation of a technology platform utilizing Bluetooth low energy (BLE) beacons to measure movement of animals, assets and personnel throughout a pig production network.
Front. Vet. Sci.
Conference Abstract:
GeoVet 2019. Novel spatio-temporal approaches in the era of Big Data.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fvets.2019.05.00086
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Received:
28 Aug 2019;
Published Online:
27 Sep 2019.
*
Correspondence:
Dr. Dale Polson, Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health Business Unit, Duluth, Georgia, United States, dale.polson@boehringer-ingelheim.com