Controlling and regulation of integrated aquaponic production systems – An approach for a management execution system (MES)

Manufacturing execution systems(MESs)play a significant role in the manufacturing paradigm.MES is there to link between the Enterprise Resource Planning(ERP)systems and the plant equipment control or Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition(SCADA)applications.In this paper the MES of the INAPRO aquaponics system which was developed to support and advise the aquaponics managers in operating the complex aquaponic farms,will be presented.One important feature of the INAPRO aquaponics system is to minimize fresh water<3%,energy and nutrient supplies.This can only be achieved by appropriate design of the fish and crop mixture,considering the fish to crop ratio,when to sow the crops etc.and to monitor the system to see whether it performing as designed or not.Therefore,the MES has a view to show the designed system with all the material flow(water,energy and nutrients)balances and also how the system will be performing for a given predictive horizon.Knowing the future developments of the system,the operator can taking corrective measures to make sure that the system is behaving as required.An example of water balance of a system with 40 m3 fish tanks coupled with a hydroponic NFT system with 1,000 m2 which can produce five tons of Tilapia and 75 tons of tomato yearly is given.

Daily activity rhythms, chronotypes, and risk-taking behavior in the signal crayfish

Consistent inter-individual differences in daily activity rhythms(i.e.,chronotypes)can have ecological consequences in determining access to food resources and avoidance of predators.The most common measure to characterize chronotypes in animals as well as humans is the onset of activity(i.e.,early or late chronotypes).However,daily activity rhythms may also differ in the relative amount of activity displayed at particular time periods.Moreover,chronotypes may also be linked to other consistent inter-individual differences in behavior(i.e.,personality),such as the propensity to take risks.Here,we used the signal crayfish Pacifastacus leniusculusto test the presence of chronotypes and risk-taking personality traits and a potential behavioral syndrome between these traits.We first exposed crayfish to 5 days of light-darkness to measure daily activity rhythms and then we applied a visual predator-simulating stimulus in 2 different contexts(neutral and food).Our results showed consistent(i.e.,across 5 days)inter-individual differences in the relative nocturnal activity displayed in the early and middle,but not in the late part of darkness hours.Moreover,while crayfish displayed inter-individual differences in risk-taking behavior,these were not found to be consistent across 2 contexts.Therefore,we were not able to formally test a behavioral syndrome between these 2 traits.In conclusion,our study provides the first evidence of chronotypes in the relative amount of activity displayed at particular time periods.This could be a valuable information for applied ecological aspects related to the signal crayfish,which is a major invasive species of freshwater ecosystems.