Effect of education on ability of AI professionals and herd-owner inseminators to detect cows not in oestrus and its relation with progesterone concentration on day of re-insemination

Path Planning of Unmanned Autonomous Helicopter Based on Human-Computer Hybrid Augmented Intelligence

Unmanned autonomous helicopter (UAH) path planning problem is an important component of the UAH mission planning system. The performance of the automatic path planner determines the quality of the UAH flight path. Aiming to produce a high-quality flight path, a path planning system is designed based on human-computer hybrid augmented intelligence framework for the UAH in this paper. Firstly, an improved artificial bee colony (I-ABC) algorithm is proposed based on the dynamic evaluation selection strategy and the complex optimization method. In the I-ABC algorithm, the following way of on-looker bees and the update strategy of nectar source are optimized to accelerate the convergence rate and retain the exploration ability of the population. In addition, a space clipping operation is proposed based on the attention mechanism for constructing a new spatial search area. The search time can be further reduced by the space clipping operation under the path planning result within acceptable changes. Moreover, the entire optimization process and results can be feeded back to the knowledge database by the human-computer hybrid augmented intelligence framework to guide subsequent path planning issues. Finally, the simulation results confirm that a feasible and effective flight path can be quickly generated by the UAH path planning system based on human-computer hybrid augmented intelligence.

Effect of delaying the time of insemination with sex-sorted semen on pregnancy rate in Holstein heifers

The objective of the study was to evaluate the interval from onset of oestrus to time of artificial insemination (AI) to obtain the optimum pregnancy rate with sex-sorted semen in Holstein heifers. Heifers in oestrus were detected and inseminated only by using heat-rumination neck collar comprised electronic identification tag at the age of 13-14 months. Heifers (n = 283) were randomly assigned to one of three groups according to the timing of insemination at 12-16 hr (G1, n = 97), at 16.1-20 hr (G2, n = 94) and at 20.1-24 hr (G3, n = 92) after reaching the activity threshold. The mean duration of oestrus was 18.6 ± 0.1 hr, and mean peak activity was found at 7.5 ± 0.1 hr after activity threshold. The mean interval from activity threshold to ovulation was 29.4 ± 0.4 hr. The overall pregnancy per AI (P/AI) was 53.0% at 29-35 days and 50.9% at 60-66 days after AI. There was a significant reduction between G1 (13.8 ± 1.4 hr) and G3 (7.9 ± 1.4 hr) related to the intervals from AI to ovulation time. Sex-sorted semen resulted in significantly higher P/AI at 29-35 days when heifers inseminated in G3 (60.9%) after oestrus than those inseminated in G1 (49.5%) and G2 (48.9%). In terms of fertility, when the temperature-humidity index (THI) was below the threshold value (THI ≤65) at the time of AI, there was a tendency (≤65; 57.2% vs. > 65; 47.1%) for high pregnancy rate. There was no effect of sire on P/AI. In addition, the interaction of the technician with the time of AI was found significant, and three-way interaction of technician, sire and time of AI was tended to be significant on pregnancy rate. Thus, in addition to delaying the time of insemination (between 20.1 and 24 hr) after oestrous detection, THI and experienced technician were also found to be critical factors in increasing fertility with the use of sex-sorted semen in Holstein heifers.