SSA - Assessing transient affective states in poultry using intracranial recording of brain oscillations.

现代禽肉产业采用高通量、大批量的工艺来饲养、运输、捕杀和加工禽类。这些措施包括将鸟类安置在大棚里，将鸟类放入运输模块，将这些模块运送到屠宰场，在那里卸货，使鸟类昏迷，杀死它们并处理尸体。这一过程的效率降低了消费者的价格，并产生了经济上可持续的蛋白质来源。但这一过程也需要具有社会可持续性，因此该行业的目标是在整个过程中保持尽可能高的福利标准。因此，该项目属于BBSRC的“管理动物福利”战略重点。工业面临的挑战是在不减少（最好是同时改善）鸟类福利的情况下改进过程。从捕捉到处理的所有步骤都可能与鸟类的总压力水平相互作用。在整个过程中监测鸟类的福利，将使行业能够评估不同加工步骤及其组合对福利的影响，并选择最高福利的组合。然而，在捕捉、运输、处理和昏迷过程中监测福利并不容易。本项目旨在开发、验证和应用一种高时间分辨率福利监测的新方法，假设福利不佳可能与短暂的恐惧和痛苦（例如在捕捞和运输期间）有关。为了监测鸟类的恐惧和痛苦状态，并将这些状态与更积极的情感状态（如积极兴奋）区分开来，我们将使用可以连接到鸟类身上而不限制它们运动的现代无线记录设备，通过植入相关大脑区域的电极记录大脑活动（局部场电位；lfp）。首先，我们将在实验室中给鸟类的海马体、杏仁核和NCL（相当于鸟类的前额皮质）植入电极，将它们暴露在不同的急性情况下（包括积极的和消极的，包括恐惧、短暂的疼痛和偏好的食物），并记录这三个区域的lfp。我们将寻找能够区分不同状态的电生理特征。然后，我们将专注于最具鉴别性的大脑区域和特征，并在CASE合作伙伴的协助下将其带入商业环境。在那里，我们将跟踪鸟类从捕获到屠宰之前的整个过程，目的是确定加工链上潜在的福利限制点或组合。到目前为止，还没有人在整个过程中监控福利。因此，我们将与我们的结果的用户协同工作。

The modern poultry meat industry employs high-throughput, high-volume processes for raising, transporting, killing and processing birds. These include housing birds in large sheds, putting birds into transport modules, transporting these modules to abattoirs, unloading them there, stunning the birds, killing them and processing the carcasses. The efficiency of this process reduces the price for the consumer and produces a financially sustainable protein source. But the processes also need to be socially sustainable, so the industry aims to maintain the highest possible welfare standards throughout this entire process. This project therefore falls into the "Welfare of Managed Animals" strategic priority of the BBSRC.The challenge to industry is to improve the processes without reducing (and ideally while improving) the welfare of the birds. All steps from catching to processing are likely to interact with each other with regard to the birds' total stress levels. Monitoring the birds' welfare throughout the process would allow the industry to assess the welfare impact of different processing steps and their combinations and choose the highest welfare combination. Monitoring welfare during catching, transportation, handling and stunning is not easy, however.This project aims to develop, validate and apply a novel approach to high temporal resolution welfare monitoring, assuming that poor welfare could be associated with short episodes of fear and pain (e.g. during catching and transport). To monitor the birds' states of fear and pain, and distinguish these states from more positive affective states (e.g. positive excitement), we will record brain activity (local field potentials; LFPs) from electrodes implanted in relevant brain areas, using modern wireless recording devices that can be attached to the birds without restricting their movements.First we will implant birds in the lab with electrodes in the hippocampus, amygdala and NCL (the avian equivalent of prefrontal cortex), expose them to different acute situations (both positive and negative, including fear, brief pain and preferred food), and record LFPs from all three areas. We will look for electrophysiological signatures that can distinguish the different states from each other. We will then focus on the most discriminating brain areas and features, and take them into a commercial setting with the assistance of our CASE partner. There, we will follow birds through from catching to just prior to slaughter, with the aim of identifying potentially welfare-limiting points or combinations along the processing chain. Nobody to date has monitored welfare throughout the entire combination of processes. We will therefore be working collaboratively with users of our results.