

If the thin shelled egg breaks whilst actually being laid there is a chance of the remnants being naturally expelled or removed by the keeper but often not.Ī broken egg in the nestbox will attract the other hens who will eat it in short order. More often than not, an egg breaking prior to being laid will result in the death of the hen. Of course, thin eggshells are a concern as the egg will easily break in transit from coop to kitchen but more concerning is when an egg breaks before being laid inside the hen.
#MISSHAPEN EGGS IN CHICKEN FREE#
Socials: Mastodon | Spoutible | CounterSocial | Post.News | Tribel | Bluesky | LinkedIn | Free Newsletter (Usually emailed on the last Friday of the month.Thin eggshells are a fairly common problem and can be more serious than you might think. Active sampling of volatile chemicals for non-invasive classification of chicken eggs by sex early in incubation, PLoS ONE 18(5):e0285726 | doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0285726 McCartney, Kristy Portillo, Huaijun Zhou, Cristina E. Source:Įva Borras, Ying Wang, Priyanka Shah, Kevin Bellido, Katherine L. “It’s been essential for a small startup like us to be able to access resources on campus,” Mr Turpen pointed out. The company utilizes proprietary technology to develop, build and sell custom chemical sensors that provide solutions of great value to multiple industries. was founded in 2015 and is based in Davis, California. This technology could potentially be developed to identify a broad range of chemicals from environmental samples, including detecting explosives, plant diseases and environmental triggers for asthma. “We see valuable opportunities to apply this technology to problems in defense and security, food and agriculture, process engineering and health care,” Mr Turpen elaborated. This system is miniaturized, inexpensive, and efficent: capable of detecting molecules at parts-per-billion concentrations whilst operating on common direct-current batteries, such as a 9-volt or watch battery. This promising technology is not limited to identifying sex in developing chicken embryos. “Her inventive genius and market intuition combined with the business and entrepreneurial experience of the seasoned SensIT founding team, are the perfect mix for translating this cutting-edge UC Davis research into societal impact.” “Professor Davis is a consummate innovator,” said Dushyant Pathak, associate vice chancellor of Technology Management and Corporate Relations and executive director of Venture Catalyst at UC Davis in a statement. She designs and implements cutting-edge chemical sensor systems to solve real-world problems and to enable trace chemical detection in challenging environments, ranging from a “breathalyzer” that can detect the health of dolphins to a noninvasive way to detect citrus greening, a plant disease that can devastate citrus crops. Professor Davis has more than 20 years of expertise at the interface of mechanical design, data analytics and chemistry. This technology was developed by a team led by human systems engineer Cristina Davis, a professor in aerospace and mechanical engineering. “We think that the hardware platform invented at UC Davis could be integrated into hatcheries”, Mr Turpen added. (Which raises the question: can scent-based mammals, particularly dogs or rats, also use smells to identify sex of a developing chicken embryo at the same age?) This study demonstrates that it is possible to sort eggs by sex during early incubation based solely on emitted volatile organic chemicals. The process could be speeded up by designing the rapid suction-cup sampling technology to test a lot of eggs at the same time. Using this method, the researchers could identify male and female embryos at 8 days of incubation with 80% accuracy, based on two minutes of sampling. “We found that there are volatile chemicals from the egg, a scent that you can capture and sort statistically,” said Tom Turpen, president and CEO of Sensit Ventures and senior author on the paper.

Professor Zhou primarily studies immunogenetics, molecular genetics, functional genomics, and bioinformatics in poultry. Sex of the eggs was then confirmed by DNA analysis by study co-author, immunogeneticist Huajin Zhou, a professor of Animal Science. The air samples were analyzed using gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. To do this, the researchers adapted suction cups that are already in use to handle eggs on a massive scale to “sniff” air emitted by the eggs without opening them. (Credit: Tom Turpen / SENSit Ventures) Tom Turpen / SENSit Ventures Sampling of volatile chemicals uses suction cups like those used for industrial handling of eggs.
