Precision Beekeeping and Selective Breeding of the Honey Bee Using Multimodal Signal Processing and Machine Learning

利用多模态信号处理和机器学习进行精准养蜂和蜜蜂选择性育种

• 批准号: 548872-2019
• 负责人: Falk, TiagoTH
• 金额: $ 15.3万
• 依托单位: Institut national de la recherche scientifique
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Alliance Grants
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=752604
• 关键词: Precision; Beekeeping; Selective; Breeding; Honey

While mostly associated with honey production, honeybees play a more crucial role in agriculture as pollinators. In fact, nearly one third of the world's food is directly dependent on bee pollination. In Canada, beekeeping is an important agricultural industry, with bees being produced for sale, honey and other hive products, as well as delivering valuable pollination services. Over the last decade, however, bee colonies have been dying off at alarming rates. Two major factors that have been identified include the proliferation of the varroa destructor parasite, which spreads deadly viruses, and failing queen bees. Visual inspection of hives is the current existing practice of bee health monitoring. Opening a beehive, however, aggravates the colony, disrupts honeybee behavior, and limits the scope of what can be done. To overcome this limitation, Nectar Technologies Inc. has developed sensor-based technologies that are placed within hives and allow for remote assessment of the health of several hives simultaneously. To date, their solutions have relied on temperature and humidity sensors to monitor queen bee presence and on external scales to monitor hive weight, a correlate of hive health and honey production. This project aims to take this "Internet of Hives" platform to the next level. By partnering with the Centre de recherche en sciences animales de Deschambault (CRSAD, a commercial queen bee breeder) and integrating additional vibration, acoustic, and CO2 sensors within the hives, we propose to develop five key innovations: 1) build multimodal correlates of phenotypic colony performance traits to allow for remote queen performance monitoring and 2) genetic parameters to be used to select best performing colonies, 3) develop automated methods to measure colony activity and strength, 4) honey production and flow, and 5) hive health. The proposed system has the potential to be low-cost, durable, and reliable, thus will be accessible to all Canadian beekeepers, large or small. The proposed project will also allow for the discovery of new science behind honey bee dynamics and health monitoring. As such, significant societal, scientific, and economic benefits to Canada are expected.

蜜蜂主要与蜂蜜产量有关，但在农业中作为传粉媒介起着更为重要的作用。实际上，世界上将近三分之一的食物直接取决于蜜蜂的授粉。在加拿大，养蜂业是一个重要的农业产业，生产蜜蜂出售，蜂蜜和其他蜂巢产品，并提供有价值的授粉服务。然而，在过去的十年中，蜜蜂菌落一直以惊人的速度消失。已经确定的两个主要因素包括瓦罗灾难寄生虫的扩散，该寄生虫传播致命的病毒和女王蜜蜂失败。蜂箱的目视检查是当前现有的Bee Health监测实践。然而，打开蜂巢会加剧殖民地，破坏蜜蜂的行为，并限制了可以做的事情的范围。为了克服这一限制，Nectar Technologies Inc.开发了基于传感器的技术，这些技术位于蜂箱内，并可以同时远程评估几个蜂箱的健康。迄今为止，他们的解决方案依靠温度和湿度传感器来监测女王蜜蜂的存在并在外部尺度上监测蜂巢重量，这是蜂巢健康和蜂蜜产生的相关性。该项目旨在将这个“蜂巢互联网”平台提升到一个新的水平。通过与科学中心合作，动物de deschambault（Crsad，商业女王蜂饲养员），并在蜂箱内整合额外的振动，声学和二氧化碳传感器，我们建议开发五个关键的创新：1）构建多模态性能的多模式相关性，以允许远程表现良好的角色绩效，以允许远程女王绩效和2）概述的参数，并允许2）概念概念和2）概括的参数，并允许2）概括2）概括2） 3）开发自动化的方法来测量菌落活性和力量，4）蜂蜜产生和流动，5）Hive Health。所提出的系统有可能是低成本，耐用且可靠的，因此，所有大型或小的加拿大养蜂人都可以使用。拟议的项目还将允许在蜜蜂动态和健康监测背后发现新科学。因此，预计将为加拿大带来重大的社会，科学和经济利益。