Odor concentrations (OC) and emissions (OE) were measured for a commercial broiler barn and a cage-layer barn in a cold region (the Canadian Prairies). Seasonal OC and OE profiles were plotted by ...monthly measurements over the course of a year from March 2015 to February 2016, and diurnal profiles were generated by 2-day measurements in cold, mild, and warm seasons, respectively. Seasonal OC and OE varied for both barns; OC was higher in the cold season, but OE was higher in the mild and warm seasons. The broiler barn had higher annual average OC (718 OU m
−3
) but slightly lower annual average OE (127 OU s
−1
AU
−1
; AU is per 500 kg of body mass) than the layer barn (574 OU m
−3
and 140 OU s
−1
AU
−1
). For the layer barn, OC and OE were reduced by 31% and 33% in the cold season and by 30% and 26% in the mild season after manure removal compared with before manure removal. Statistical results showed increased outdoor temperature and ventilation rate (VR) were associated with decreased OC but increased OE for both barns. Finally, both single linear and multi-linear regression models of OE were developed.
Earth-to-air heat exchangers (EAHE) can reduce the energy consumption required for heating and cooling of buildings. The composition and the thermal characteristics of the soil influence the heat ...exchange capacity, and the soil moisture can furthermore affect thermal performance of EAHE. The aim of this study was to compare the thermal performance of EAHE in dry and artificially wetted soil. Tests were carried out in the Basra Province (Iraq), in a semi-desert area. Two experimental EAHE were built in a poultry barn and tested from June 2013 to September 2013. The pipe exchangers were buried at 2 m deep. One heat exchanger operated in dry soil (DE), while the other one operated in artificially wetted soil (WE). In the WE system, a drip tubing placed 10 cm above the air pipe wetted the soil around the exchanger. Air temperatures at the inlet and at the outlet of both the exchangers as well as soil temperature at 2 m deep were continuously monitored. The experimental results confirmed that wetting the soil around EAHE improves the general heat exchange efficiency. The coefficient of cooling performance (COP) of the earth-to-air heat exchangers system was evaluated on the basis of the ratio between the heat removed from the air or added to the air and the energy input. During the day, with an average COP of 6.41, the WE system cooled the air more than the DE system, which reported a value of 5.07. On average, in the hottest hours of the day, the outlet temperature of the WE was 37.35°C while in the DE it was 38.91°C. Moreover, during the nighttime, the WE system warmed the air more than the DE system.
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FFLJ, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, ODKLJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UL, UM, UPUK
Objective
Poultry farm workers are exposed to barn air and suffer from various respiratory disorders. Due to frequent prevalence of endotoxin in the farm settings workers can get co‐exposed to barn ...air and endotoxin. The study was aimed to explore the pulmonary damage following long‐term multiple exposures to poultry barn air with or without endotoxin.
Methods
We studied the pulmonary expression of Toll‐like receptor 4 (TLR4) and Interleukin‐1β (IL‐1β) by exposing Swiss albino mice to poultry barn air for 6 days (Monday‐Saturday) in a week for 5 and 10 weeks. At the end of exposure, animals were challenged with lipopolysaccharide (LPS) or normal saline solution @80 μg/mouse intranasally. Histopathology, bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid and blood analysis were used to characterize lung damage. mRNA and protein expression of TLR4 and IL‐1β were evaluated using quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) and immunohistochemistry, respectively.
Results
Histopathology along with TLC and DLC of blood and BAL fluid revealed lung damage following multiple exposures and damage was severe in combination with LPS. Exposures altered mRNA and protein expression of TLR‐4 and IL‐1β and the expression was more marked following 30 days of exposure. Further LPS co‐challenge showed a synergistic effect on the expression of TLR4 and IL‐1β.
Conclusions
The data suggest that long‐term exposures with or without LPS caused lung damage and altered the pulmonary expression of TLR4 and IL‐1β.
Full text
Available for:
CEKLJ, FZAB, GIS, IJS, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
The poultry sector in India being a commercial activity requires workers to spend more number of hours inside the barns. The exposure of workers to barn air may also increase susceptibility to ...secondary microbial challenges. However, there are no data on the health effects of exposure to the barn from tropical climates. Because of the central role of the toll like receptor 4 (TLR-4) in endotoxin-induced lung inflammation, we evaluated expression of TLR-4 following single and multiple exposures to poultry barn air followed by lipopolysaccharides (LPS) challenge. Male mice (80) aging 7-8 weeks were divided into 4 groups, viz. 3 treatments and 1 control (20; each). Among the treatment groups, Group 1 was exposed to poultry barn air for single day, group 2 for 6 days (Mon to Sat) and group 3 for 24 days (4 weeks, Mon to Sat) for 8 hrs. At the end of exposure period, half of the animals (10) from each group were challenged with LPS @ 100µg/ animal. Immediately following sacrifice, the lung tissues were collected to study the expression profile of TLR-4 mRNA by quantitative RT- PCR. Single exposure did not show any significant change in the expression of TLR-4 mRNA, while 6 days multiple exposures resulted in almost 6 fold increase in the expression of TLR-4 mRNA. There was no change in the expression of TLR-4 mRNA after 24 days multiple exposures compared to control suggesting that prolong multiple exposures may induce adaptation. However, single and 6 and 24 days multiple exposures followed by LPS challenge showed 6, 47 and 17 fold increase in the expression of TLR-4 mRNA, respectively. The data showed exposure to poultry barn air alters TLR-4 expression which may underlie altered responsiveness to LPS challenge.
Concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) pose serious risks to air, water, and public health, but have proven to be challenging to regulate. The U.S. Government Accountability Office notes that ...a basic challenge is the lack of comprehensive location information on CAFOs. We use the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Imagery Program 1 m/pixel aerial imagery to detect poultry CAFOs across the continental USA. We train convolutional neural network models to identify individual poultry barns and apply the best-performing model to over 42 TB of imagery to create the first national open-source dataset of poultry CAFOs We validate the model predictions against held-out validation set on poultry CAFO facility locations from ten hand-labeled counties in California and demonstrate that this approach has significant potential to fill gaps in environmental monitoring.
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