A project investigating how data from multiple sensors on pig farms could be interpreted through machine learning models to better predict disease has earned the student behind it the prestigious 2026 Nick Bird Award.
Harper Adams University student Declan Parker, a farmer’s son from Lancashire, has won award for his Masters Engineering project – ‘Evaluation of machine-learning fused sensor data for disease prediction in a commercial nursery pig unit’.
The Nick Bird Award was set up by Reading-based energy specialists, Farmex, in recognition of the work carried out by Nick Bird, a director of the company, who died in 2013. His 17 years of working in the field of real-time monitoring of pig production has had a significant impact on the industry and, increasingly, other livestock sectors.
The award – a perpetual trophy and a cheque for £500 – is for an outstanding piece of written work that involves recorded observations of an agricultural process, data analysis and interpretation with demonstrable added value for farmers.
Declan looked at whether combing data, through machine-learning models, from several sensors on a large pig farm could spot early signs of disease more effectively than using a single sensor alone.
“Most farms use these sensors separately or struggle to turn raw data into something useful,” he said. “My study found that fused data sets, combining multiple sources, consistently outperformed single-source models, particularly water-only models.
“This suggests acoustic, water, environmental and management data all carry complementary information, and combining them correctly can predict disease better than any one source alone.
“Although the data was limited to one study farm – so the results aren’t fully conclusive – I think for pig farmers it highlights the potential of smart data use in their systems, to boost productivity and welfare.”
Having received his degree, Declan has joined Staffordshire dairy engineering company, Jace Supplies Ltd, where he will be applying the knowledge gained on a practical level.
Farmex director Hugh Crabtree said: “This is a really excellent piece of work and very much in line with where data use has to go – getting AI to do the analytical graft
“Humans have not really done very much with it, even after 30 years. Commercial realisation of the full potential value from data is still lagging behind. It is clear to the judges that AI is definitely the way forward.”