Abstract submission deadline: January 23, 2026
Welcome to the 4th EAAP Regional Meeting – Mediterranean Region
The EAAP regional meeting aims to highlight key animal science discoveries and novel approaches, related to specific regional topics, which could be directly or potentially applied to management and practice. The meeting will be held on May 20th – 22nd, 2026, at the University of Sassari (Sardinia, Italy). The meeting will have interesting animal science sessions including one plenary session.
Parallel sessions open to abstract submission:
The following sessions are preliminary and will be confirmed based on the number and topics of the abstracts received.
(co-organised with ERFP, EAAP Med WG, EAAP AnGR WG, Chairs: D. Bojkovski, G. Hadjipavlou, Ch. Ligda)
The session focuses on the characterization, conservation, and sustainable use of local and transboundary breeds as key components of resilient livestock production. Contributions are invited on studies addressing genetic diversity, adaptive traits, and production-environment interactions, as well as the use of genomic and phenotypic tools to evaluate breed performance under climatic and management variability. Case studies linking breed diversity with ecosystem services, circular farming, and socio-economic sustainability are particularly encouraged. The session also seeks to discuss regional collaboration and policy frameworks that support the long-term management of animal genetic resources.
(Chairs: M. Odintsov, M. Karatzia)
The session explores Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) and Precision Agriculture (PA) solutions tailored to improve animal, farm, and landscape-level management in Mediterranean contexts. Contributions may include (but are not limited to): IoT-based monitoring, satellite imagery, wearable technologies, agricultural drones, image analysis, data management, AI integration, and the socio-technical dimensions of stakeholder acceptance and adoption of digital tools. Given the vast variability of the Mediterranean farming system landscape, PLF and PA research outcomes from all systems, including low-input and extensive production systems, would be welcome.
(Chair: I. Poulopoulou)
The session aims to identify the environmental, economic, and social challenges of the Mediterranean livestock farming systems related to climate change, resource availability, and limited infrastructure development. This session welcomes abstracts that analyse pathways to enhance productive, technical, environmental, economic, and social resilience through sustainable transitions based on biodiversity, agroecology, and adaptive management. Contributions focusing on carbon strategies, climate mitigation and adaptation measures, and innovations that combine productivity while achieving sustainable ecosystem conservation are encouraged. The session promotes interdisciplinary discussions and practical solutions tailored to local contexts.
(Chair: M.O. Nozieres-Petit)
This session aims to question how and why (agro)-pastoral systems change to face global challenges and preserve their multifunctionality. The contributions are invited to reflect on their strengths and weaknesses and the “key operating functioning rules” present in these systems. These strengths and rules could also be useful for increasing the sustainability and addressing challenges in other forms of livestock farming, as they pursue agroecological transition and adaptation and mitigation to climate change.
(Chair: M. Spehar)
As the livestock sector strives to meet ambitious climate targets, producers face the challenge of balancing environmental goals with animal productivity, health and climate resilience. Novel genomic selection tools and phenotyping strategies are needed to optimize mitigation, adaptation, health and profitability traits. Contributions are welcome for phenotyping and genomic evaluation strategies for novel and standard traits aiming at enhancing balanced animal resilience in changing and/or harsh environmental conditions.
(Chairs: G. Foggi, A. Cannas)
The session addresses the nutritional challenges and opportunities related to feed and forage resources for both ruminant and monogastric production systems in Mediterranean environments. Topics may include the characterisation and utilisation of local forage and feed resources, including alternative and agro-industrial by-products, and their effects on animal performance, metabolism, and nutritional requirements. Moreover, the session may include contributions addressing challenges of forage production and low-impact preservation techniques for feed under Mediterranean conditions.
(Chair: N. M’Hamdi)
This session will explore the critical links between animal health, welfare, and the overall sustainability of livestock farming. It will examine how prioritising animal welfare not only enhances the productivity and resilience of livestock systems but also contributes to the long-term viability of the sector, particularly in the Mediterranean context. The session will highlight the economic, environmental, and social benefits of improved animal health and welfare, emphasising how these factors influence farmer well-being, farm profitability, and public perception. Additionally, it will address strategies to ensure animal welfare while maintaining sustainable and economically viable farming practices.
(Chairs: I. Casasus, G. Foggi)
This session explores various strategies to valorise animal products and enhance their quality. Contributions may focus on the valorisation of products; the role of local breeds and production systems in adding value to animal-derived products; dietary or breeding strategies aiming at improving product quality; and the development of tools for the determination of product quality and traceability.
Mediterranean Livestock Systems: Pathways towards sustainability
The Plenary session addresses the pathways to achieve sustainability under Mediterranean livestock farming systems. Integration of heritage, tradition, and innovation will be explored, along with policy and social aspects, with the overall aim being the Med livestock system transformation. (keynote speakers to be defined)
Private research consultant, Scotland
Challenges for animal production in the changing world
Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Germany
Current and future directions in livestock genetic improvement: advancing resilience and sustainability through genotype-to-phenotype research
University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, Austria
Nutrigenomics – chances and challenges in animal production
Agricultural Research Organization (ARO), Volcani Center, Israel
Applications of data science, digital tools and precision farming in changing-world’s animal production
Institute of Genetics and Animal Biotechnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences
Animal welfare – does it pay off?
Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences, Germany
Public perception of livestock production
International Scientific Board
Gianni Battacone – University of Sassari – Italy
Danijela Bojkovski – University of Ljubljana – Slovenia
Isabel Casasús Pueyo – CITA Aragón – Spain
Antonello Cannas – University of Sassari – Italy
Xabier Diaz de Otalora Aguirre – Universitat Politècnica de València – Spain
Giulia Foggi – ETH Zürich – Switzerland
Georgia Hadjipavlou – Agricultural Research Institute – Cyprus
Maria-Anastasia Karatzia – ELGO-DIMITRA – Greece
Nicolò Pietro Paolo Macciotta – University of Sassari – Italy
Maria do Rosário Fernandes Marques – INIAV – Portugal
Filippo Miglior – University of Guelph – Canada
Naceur M’hamdi – Institut National Agronomique de Tunisie – Tunisia
Marie-Odile Nozières-Petit – INRAE – France
Mikhail Odintsov-Vaintrub – Regrowth – Italy
Ioanna Poulopoulou – Agricultural University of Athens – Greece
Andrea Rosati – European Federation for Animal Science (EAAP) – Italy
Marija Špehar – Croatian Agency for Agriculture and Food – Croatia
Organizing Committee
Nicolò Pietro Paolo Macciotta – University of Sassari – Italy
Gianni Battacone – University of Sassari – Italy
Antonello Cannas – University of Sassari – Italy
Andrea Rosati – European Federation for Animal Science (EAAP) – Italy
Federico Liguori – European Federation for Animal Science (EAAP) – Italy
The easiest way to reach Sassari by plane is to fly to Alghero-Fertilia Airport (AHO), located about 30 km from the city. The airport is connected to several European cities with regular and seasonal flights, especially in spring and summer. From the airport, you can reach Sassari by bus, train, or taxi in about 30–40 minutes.
If you prefer to travel by sea, you can reach Sardinia by ferry. The nearest ports to Sassari are Porto Torres (about 20 minutes away by car) and Olbia (around 1 hour and 30 minutes away). Ferries to these ports operate regularly from several Italian cities such as Genoa, Livorno, and Civitavecchia, as well as from some French ports. From Porto Torres or Olbia, you can easily continue to Sassari by car, bus, or train.
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Chris Knight is a private research consultant based in Ayr, Scotland. Historically, Ayr was the home of the Hannah Research Institute where Chris spent 27 years as a lactation researcher. In 2006 the Institute was closed as part of a large governmental reorganisation, and a year later Chris became Professor of Production Animal Physiology in the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. There he spent nine happy years working with students eager to learn about physiology (including heading-up an Erasmus Mundus MSc Programme, Food of Life) and researching various lactation-related topics. These included water-transport through the mammary cell, interactions between pathological and physiological inflammatory responses in the mammary gland and the final establishment of copious milk secretion (lactogenesis stage three) in animals and humans. He then became focused on welfare physiology in dairy animals and was heavily involved in the development of what became known as Precision Livestock Farming, although he prefers the acronym CALM Farming (Computing Assisted Livestock Management). In 2016 with EU COST funding in place and the invitation to become Editor in Chief of the Journal of Dairy Research he returned to Scotland. His consultancy interests focus on research dissemination and funding but he also retains several research collaborations.
Director, Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN)
Professor, Animal Breeding and Farm Animal Husbandry, University of Rostock
Prof. Dr. Klaus Wimmers is an expert in the physiological, genetic, and epigenetic foundations underlying trait expression and differentiation, particularly in relation to animal welfare and resource efficiency. As Director of FBN and Professor at the University of Rostock, he leads a team focused on these themes and actively participates in FAANG (Functional Annotation of Animal Genomes) initiatives, contributing to genome annotation efforts in pigs and chickens.
Susanne Kreuzer-Redmer’s research focuses on the interaction between genetics, nutrition, and immunity in farm animals. A key area of her work is investigating the role of microRNAs as post-transcriptional gene regulators, as well as their potential as biomarkers—specifically circulating microRNAs in blood—to identify and monitor pathological conditions in animals.
In addition, she develops cell culture models for various species, including chickens, pigs, cattle, and horses, to explore the immunomodulatory effects of dietary components such as probiotics and functional feed additives. Dr. Kreuzer-Redmer also contributes to animal nutrition research at the European level, serving as Vice President of the Commission on Animal Nutrition of the European Federation of Animal Science (EAAP).
Ilan Halachmi is Senior Research Scientist, Head of the Lab For Precision livestock farming (PLF) at Volcani Institute.
Ilan grew up on a happy four-generation family farm, cultivating livestock and varied seasonal arable farming. The farm is still active in the family. Ilan had a mechanical engineering BSc study at the Technion Haifa, an MSc in BGU, and PhD in Wageningen, Netherlands.
Selected International EU research projects: 2020 EU Horizon – ‘TechCare’; ‘Sm@RT’, EU-FACCE- ‘FreeWalk’; ‘OptiBarn’ Optimized animal-specific barn climatization facing temperature rise and increased climate variability. EU-FP7: ‘EU-PLF- Bright Farm by Precision Livestock Farming. ‘Bio-business.. EU-FP6. Optiscore – creation of animal condition scoring protocols using new electronic sensors.
Dr Irene Camerlink is a researcher in animal behaviour and welfare, with a focus on the social behaviour of pigs. She is employed as Associate Professor (Hab.) at the Institute of Genetics and Animal Biotechnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. She is Editor-in-chief of the journal Applied Animal Behaviour Science, and editor of the books ‘Animal Welfare in Practice: Pigs’ and ‘Bridging Research Disciplines to Advance Animal Welfare Science’. She studies pig behaviour and welfare by combining genetics, ethology, behavioural ecology and social sciences.
Gesa Busch is Professor for Food Consumption and Wellbeing at the University of Applied Sciences Weihenstephan-Treisdorf since 2022. Her research focuses on agriculture-society interactions, social acceptability of farming systems with a focus on ethics and animal welfare, and sustainable consumer and nutrition behavior. She is passionate about understanding societies view on agriculture and enabling sustainable food choices for consumers.
Prof. Busch studied Agricultural Sciences with specialization in Agribusiness Management and obtained her PhD in Agricultural Sciences in the year 2016 from the University of Goettingen. During her PhD she spent 6 months in the Animal Welfare Program at the University of British Columbia, Canada. Between 2016 and 2019 she worked at the Free University of Bolzano-Bozen, Italy and between 2019 and 2022 she hold a Post-Doc position at the University of Göttingen.
Christina Ligda works as a Research Director in the Veterinary Research Institute in Thessaloniki (Hellenic Agricultural Organization – DIMITRA). She holds a Phd in Agriculture, in Animal Genetics and Breeding, from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her research interests and expertise refer to animal breeding with focus on dairy sheep and goats, genetic diversity of farm animal genetic resources, conservation schemes for small populations, sustainable production systems and breeding schemes. She is the Chair of the EAAP Mediterranean WG; National Coordinator for the management of AnGR at FAO and ERFP. of the ERFP SC (European Regional Focal Point for AnGR); Member of the Editorial Board of the Genetic Resources Journal; Member of the Editorial Advisory Group of Small Ruminant Research; Vice-Chair of the Hellenic Association of Animal Science. She participated in (or coordinated) several international, national and bilateral projects on genetic evaluation of dairy sheep and cattle, genetic diversity, conservation of AnGR and sustainable breeding schemes. Selected projects: Εuropean Network for interactive and innovative knowledge exchange on animal health and nutrition between the sheep industry actors and stakeholders – EUROSHEEP (HORIZON 2020); HORIZON 2020 MSCA – RISE HIGHLANDS.2; HORIZON 2020-SFS-2017-1, Coordination and support action FARMERS’ PRIDE www.farmerspride.eu; Breeding and management practices towards resilient and productive sheep and goat systems based on locally adapted breeds – PerFORM / www.arim-perform.net (funded in the frame of the ARIMNet ERANET project); Mediterranean biodiversity as a tool for the sustainable development of the small ruminant sector: from traditional knowledge to innovation – DoMEsTIc / www.arim-domestic.net (funded in the frame of the ARIMNet ERANET project) (Coordinator of the Consortium); Genetic Adaptation of bovine LIvestock and production systems in the MEDiterranean region – GALIMED (funding INRA); Heritage Sheep (EC 870/04); Sustainable conservation of animal genetic resources in marginal rural areas: integrating molecular genetics, socio-economics and geostatistical approaches (ECONOGENE – QLRT-2000-02461); PASTOMED (Interreg IIIC)
Professor in Animal Science.
Head of the Department of Animal Nutrition and Biotechnology, and Fisheries, Faculty of Animal Science, The University of Agriculture in Krakow, Krakow, Poland.
Head of Doctoral School of The University of Agriculture in Krakow.
Author of over 800 publications, including 122 original papers in peer-reviewed indexed periodicals (Journal of Dairy Science, Journal of Animal Science, Livestock Production Science, Animal Feed Science and Technology). Author of many advisory publications for milk producers, cow and calf nutrition advisers and veterinarians.
The main fields of research activity include:
feeding of high-yielding cows,
monitoring and prevention of metabolic diseases in dairy cows, especially ketosis
protein, amino acids, and fats in dairy cow diets,
protein, and energy evaluation systems for ruminants,
systems of dairy calf rearing,
additives to promote the growth and development of dairy calves.
Co-author of a national monitoring system for subclinical ketosis of dairy cows based on the determination of ketone bodies in milk using the FTIR technique.
A very well-known in Poland speaker of numerous courses, lectures, and seminars for students, farmers, extension workers, feed distributors, and veterinarians. Supervisor of several PhD students, and coordinator of numerous scientific projects conducted on ruminants, mainly dairy cows and calves. Expert in practical dairy cow and dairy calf feeding.
