Summary of Paper Received 19th JSAM Junior Academic Award: Machine Vision Diagnosis of Eyes for Vitamin A Conditions in Japanese Black Cattle

摘要

The beef marbling standard is an important indicator of beef quality. Several studies have shown that the beef marbling standard can be increased by keeping cattle at a low vitamin A level during middle fattening stage. Currently, Japanese farmers actively manipulate the cattles vitamin A to a minimum desired level to produce beef with higher marbling standards. However, if the serum vitamin A levels drop lower than the minimum desired level of 30 IU/dL, cattle become susceptible to several diseases such as nyctalopia, xerophthalmia, papilledema, and diarrhea. Thus, knowing the current vitamin A status of cattle is a key to precision feeding management. Blood assays are the conventional way to measure vitamin A levels at the moment However, they are expensive and the procedure to acquire the blood can stress the cattle. Thus, an alternative system which can indicate the vitamin A status of cattle would contribute to feeding management during vitamin A manipulated period.