Automatic Control and System Dynamics Lab, Technische Universität Chemnitz, Chemnitz, Germany.
PLoS One. 2020 Sep 18;15(9):e0239084. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0239084. eCollection 2020.
Larvae of Hermetia illucens, also commonly known as black soldier fly (BSF) have gained significant importance in the feed industry, primarily used as feed for aquaculture and other livestock farming. Mathematical models such as the Von Bertalanffy growth model and dynamic energy budget models are available for modelling the growth of various organisms but have their demerits for their application to the growth and development of BSF. Also, such dynamic models were not yet applied to the growth of the BSF larvae despite models proven to be useful for automation of industrial production process (e.g. feeding, heating/cooling, ventilation, harvesting, etc.). This work primarily focuses on developing a model based on the principles of the afore mentioned models from literature that can provide accurate mathematical description of the dry mass changes throughout the life cycle and the transition of development phases of the larvae. To further improve the accuracy of these models, various factors affecting the growth and development such as temperature, feed quality, feeding rate, moisture content in feed, and airflow rate are developed and integrated into the dynamic growth model. An extensive set of data was aggregated from various literature and used for the model development, parameter estimation and validation. Models describing the environmental factors were individually validated based on the data sets collected. In addition, the dynamic growth model was also validated for dry mass evolution and development stage transition of larvae reared on different substrate feeding rates. The developed models with the estimated parameters performed well, highlighting their potential application in decision-support systems and automation for large scale production.
水虻幼虫，也通常被称为黑水虻（BSF），在饲料行业中具有重要意义，主要用作水产养殖和其他畜牧业的饲料。有许多数学模型可用于模拟各种生物体的生长，例如 von Bertalanffy 生长模型和动态能量预算模型，但这些模型在应用于 BSF 的生长和发育时存在缺陷。此外，尽管已有模型被证明可用于自动化工业生产过程（例如喂养、加热/冷却、通风、收获等），但这些动态模型尚未应用于 BSF 幼虫的生长。这项工作主要侧重于从文献中基于上述模型的原理开发一个模型，该模型可以提供整个生命周期内干物质变化和幼虫发育阶段转变的准确数学描述。为了进一步提高这些模型的准确性，开发了各种影响生长和发育的因素，例如温度、饲料质量、喂养率、饲料中的水分含量和气流率，并将其集成到动态生长模型中。从各种文献中汇总了大量数据，用于模型开发、参数估计和验证。根据收集到的数据集，分别验证了描述环境因素的模型。此外，还针对在不同基质喂养率下饲养的幼虫的干物质演化和发育阶段转变，对动态生长模型进行了验证。具有估计参数的开发模型表现良好，突出了它们在大规模生产中的决策支持系统和自动化中的潜在应用。
