1. Leveraging latent representations for milk yield prediction and interpolation using deep learning
- Author
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Liseune, Arno, Salamone, Matthieu, Van den Poel, Dirk, Van Ranst, Bonifacius, Hostens, Miel, FAH GZ herkauwer, and FAH GZ herkauwer
- Subjects
0106 biological sciences ,Convolutional neural network ,Horticulture ,01 natural sciences ,Animal monitoring ,Milk yield ,Lactation ,Milk yield prediction ,Statistics ,medicine ,Mathematics ,business.industry ,Deep learning ,food and beverages ,Forestry ,Autoencoder ,04 agricultural and veterinary sciences ,Milk yield interpolation ,Computer Science Applications ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,Multilayer perceptron ,040103 agronomy & agriculture ,0401 agriculture, forestry, and fisheries ,Sequential data ,Artificial intelligence ,business ,Agronomy and Crop Science ,010606 plant biology & botany - Abstract
In this study, we propose a lactation model that estimates the daily milk yield by using autoencoders to generate a latent representation of all milk yields observed during the entire lactation cycle, irrespective of the length of the time interval between the different measurements. More specifically, we propose a sequential autoencoder (SAE) to process the sequential data, extract and decode the low-dimensional representations and generate the milk yield sequences. The SAE is compared with a more traditional multilayer perceptron model (MLP) which uses herd and parity information and lagged milk yields as input. Results show that incorporating the recorded daily milk yields, lactation number, herd statistics as well as reproduction and health events the cow encountered during the lactation cycle results in the most qualitative latent representations. Moreover, by leveraging these low-dimensional encodings, the SAE reconstructed the entire milk yield curve with a higher accuracy than the MLP. Hence, we present a framework that is able to infer missing milk yields along the entire lactation curve which facilitates selection and culling decisions as well as the estimation of future earnings and costs. Furthermore, the model allows farmers to enhance their animal monitoring systems as it incorporates the sequence of health and reproduction events to forecast the cow’s future productivity.
- Published
- 2020