Agricultural Sciences

This course studies basic concepts of applied animal and dairy science, covering the following topics: comparative physiology, anatomy, nutrition, genetics, reproduction, animal product, immunology, microbiology, environment biology, and animal behavior. 

This course gives an introduction to the principles behind effective operational quality systems in these complex food production chains. Major theoretical topics of the course include the relationship between food properties and quality attributes in the food production chain; traceability of food products in the food production chain; basic principles of operations management; principles of major technological tools, methods, and techniques in quality control and inspection; and introduction to major quality assurance standards. The course contains assignments related to these 4 topics. The assignments serve as a basis for critical analysis of factors influencing the actual operation of the implemented quality system.

This course examines a pertinent challenge of humankind: how to feed 12 billion people while maintaining the integrity and function of our planet. It challenges participants with contrasting viewpoints for a nuanced understanding of the multidimensional aspects of food production and consumption. Course participants explore the food debate as consumers and scholars, with focus on the science behind innovation of food and food systems, locally and globally. Course participants map the future of food and agriculture with view of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals.

This course covers how to choose pre-fermentation operations, assess the result, and determine and control any corrections to the harvest. It also discusses how to lead the transformation of grapes into wine depending on the type of product sought and regulatory and hygiene requirements; differentiate the production routes of traditional red wines; and differentiate the typicality.

This course covers technical-commercial language in English used in the field of eonology (wine-making). It covers vocabulary used to discuss sensory analysis and tasting comments. It also focuses on professional communication techniques used in presentations, writing a CV, composing emails, engaging in sales, as well as interviews and promotions. 

This course covers how to select and control the implantation of a yeast strain; control fermentation kinetics by controlling temperature, oxygen, activators, and nutritional factors; follow the progress of alcoholic fermentation and malolactic fermentation using appropriate techniques and analyses to determine the time of runoff and the method of racking; remedy fermentation stops, select and control the implantation of a strain of lactic acid bacteria, control fermentation kinetics by controlling temperature and nutritional factors, and remedy fermentation stops; carry out microbiological control of the product adapted to market demand; and carry out microbiological analyses adapted to monitoring populations of yeasts, fermentative bacteria, and spoilage microorganisms at all stages of production.

This course introduces the theory, agronomic practices, and ecological mechanisms of Organic Production Systems. First, the different approaches and production methods of soils, plants, trees, and animals in organic farming are presented with lectures, farm excursions, and farmer interviews. Different farming systems such as organic farming, biodynamic farming, nature-inclusive agriculture, regenerative agriculture, conservation agriculture, agroforestry, and permaculture are presented and discussed. Secondly, the course focuses specifically on the integration and cooperation of the different agricultural elements and concentrates on the interactions between annual and perennial arable crops, livestock species, trees, soils, and landscapes in the Dutch/European environment. Examples from all over the world are used to demonstrate integration and cooperation. The course uses certified organic systems as the baseline and starting point. This course does not discuss conventional farming practices.

This course is an introduction to the chemistry of foods, more specifically the chemistry of groups of compounds present in food: carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, phenolic compounds, and enzymes. Chemical changes that take place during the storage and processing of crops and food are learned. In addition, during the laboratory classes, students design experiments, analyze the composition of food products, and write a scientific lab report. Food technologists should be able to estimate the relevance of various chemical and enzymatic processes by making calculations. To practice this part of food chemistry, the quantification of specific reactions is practiced in calculation cases.

This course covers how to differentiate wine-growing soils and understand how, along with the climate, they influence the functioning of the plant and maturation. It also discusses how to characterize maturation and the biochemical processes involved in deciding the harvest date; understand the organization and functioning of the plant to produce quality grapes in a given pedo-climatic context; and use all the data on the organization and functioning of the plant to produce quality grapes in a case study context.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale degree program and is intended for advanced level students. Enrolment is by permission of the instructor. The course focuses on topics including: the basics for ICT, big data, and IoT; the introduction to IoT, application scenarios, enabling definitions and technologies, and cloud and fog computing; the main components of IoT solutions, and big data and references to Artificial Intelligence; and IoT and big data services from the product to the service, and application cases in smart agriculture. The course content is divided into 6 parts: 1) introduction to computer science; 2) Internet of Things (IoT); 3) big data and Artificial Intelligence; 4) tools for data analysis, elaboration, and visualizations; 5) field work; and 6) seminar.