RESUMO Objetivou-se verificar o efeito da suplementação de diferentes relações de zinco orgânico e de cobre inorgânico, bem como comparar os resultados com a dieta controle de codornas japonesas, sobre o desempenho produtivo e a qualidade dos ovos. Foram realizados dois experimentos na área experimental da Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo: variando os níveis de zinco orgânico e mantendo os de cobre recomendados e outro variando os níveis de cobre inorgânico. O período experimental foi de 84 dias, divididos em períodos de 21 dias. Foram usadas cinco pré-misturas minerais. Foram analisadas variáveis de desempenho e qualidade dos ovos. Foi observado primeiramente que as variáveis avaliadas não foram afetadas de forma significativa pelas diferentes relações dos minerais, exceto para pesos relativo e absoluto da casca. No segundo ensaio, não houve interação entre os níveis de zinco e de cobre nem entre estes e a dieta controle, para nenhuma das variáveis observadas; quando analisadas as médias individuais, foi observada diferença significativa para taxa de postura, relação ovos comerciais e totais, consumo de ração e na unidade Haugh. Pode-se concluir que a relação de 35mg/kg de zinco orgânico e a de 3,5mg/kg de cobre inorgânico atenderam as necessidades nutricionais dos animais para desempenho e qualidade de ovos.

ABSTRACT The objective of this study was to verify the effect of the supplementation of different organic zinc and inorganic copper ratios and to compare the results with the Japanese quail control diet on the productive performance and egg quality. Two experiments were carried out in the experimental area of the Federal University of Espírito Santo, varying the levels of organic zinc and maintaining the recommended copper and the other varying levels of inorganic copper. The experimental period was 84 days. Five mineral premixes were used. Performance and egg quality variables were analyzed. It was first observed that the evaluated variables were not affected significantly by the different mineral relations, except for relative and absolute weight of the bark. In the second test, there was no interaction between the zinc and copper levels, neither between the control and the control diet, for any of the variables observed, when analyzing the individual means, a significant difference was observed for posture rate, commercial and total eggs ratio, feed intake, and in the Haugh Unit. It can be concluded that the ratio of 35mg/kg organic zinc and 3,5mg/kg of inorganic copper met the nutritional requirements of the animals for performance and egg quality.

In this work, the ability of artificial neural nets was investigated for the on-line biomass prediction of the simulated growth of a strain of Bacillus thuringiensis in fed-batch mode. For this purpose, multilayered backpropagation nets with sigmoid nodes were trained. The patterns were composed of input data on current values of biomass concentration, limiting substrate concentration and dilution rate, and output data on prediction of biomass concentration for the following step. The dilution rate was disturbed by a PRBS input, and simulations were conducted using a phenomenological experimentally validated model. The nets were able to predict the biomass concentration for different feeding techniques, and they were also compared with the variable estimation technique using the extended Kalman filter.

In this work, the growth of Bacillus thuringiensis var. israelensis, a bioinsecticide producer, is investigated. Experiments were carried out in batch mode in order to obtain kinetic model parameters that were further applied to simulate fed-batch processes. The fed-batch mode allows more flexibility in the control of the substrate concentration in the culture medium. Different techniques, such as constant feeding, "bang-bang" control and model based control (exponential feeding and singular control), were compared. For the techniques based on a model, combinations of models with and without a substrate inhibition parameter were used to represent the simulated process and the internal model of the feeding controller. Singular control based on the model with an inhibition parameter proved to be the most robust controller.