Objective
SmartCow integrates key European cattle research infrastructures, to promote their coordinated use and development and thereby help the European cattle sector face the challenge of sustainable production. Covering all the relevant scientific fields and the diversity of cattle types and production systems, SmartCow will provide the academic and private research communities with easy access to 11 major research infrastructures from 7 countries (18 installations) of high quality services and resources. These are needed to develop innovative and ethical solutions for efficient use of animal and feed resources that promote animal welfare and healthy livestock, as well as sustainable competitiveness.
SmartCow combines strong scientific and technical skills in animal nutrition (in vivo methods for nutrient utilisation and emissions measurements), genetics (genotyped animals, phenotyping capabilities), health and welfare (sensors and automatic recordings of physiological and behavioural traits) and ethics in animal experimentation. A central promotion and management of transnational access to the research infrastructures will provide access to around 10,000 cow.weeks and facilitate up to 33 research projects involving 59 users. Networking activities will harmonise and standardise procedures especially in animal care and measurements, design of experiments, data recording and analysis thanks to a cloud-based data-platform specifically developed in the project. Joint research activities will produce refined methods and proxies to evaluate feed efficiency and emissions, develop new protocols to reduce the use of animals and produce new methods to exploit sensor data for cattle husbandry. Promotion of transnational access and dissemination of SmartCow outcomes and innovations for maximum impact will be supported by a Stakeholder Platform composed of pre- and post-farm gate industry, farmer organisations, NGOs, policy makers at national and EU levels.
Fields of science
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesphysical geographycartography
- medical and health scienceshealth sciencesnutrition
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringsensors
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesatmospheric sciencesclimatologyclimatic changesnorth atlantic oscillation
- agricultural sciencesanimal and dairy sciencedomestic animalsanimal husbandry
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
RIA - Research and Innovation actionCoordinator
75007 Paris Cedex 07
France
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Participants (13)
EH9 3JG Edinburgh
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6708 PB Wageningen
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6708 PB Wageningen
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RG6 6AH Reading
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18196 Dummerstorf
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R93 Carlow
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8000 Aarhus C
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08140 Caldes De Montbui Barcelona
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5030 Gembloux
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75012 Paris
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The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.
00161 Roma
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AL5 2JQ Harpenden
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75015 Paris
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