UC Davis

The environmental impacts of livestock agriculture include the production of greenhouse gasses (GHG) such as methane (CH4) through enteric fermentation. Recent advances in our understanding of methanogenesis have led to the development of animal feed additives (AFA) that can reduce enteric CH4 emissions. However, many interacting factors impact hydrogen (H2) and CH4 production and AFA efficacy, including animal factors, basal diet, particle and fluid outflow, microbial populations, rumen fluid pH, and fermentative cofactor dynamics. Characterizing the response of rumen fermentation to AFA is essential for optimizing AFA implementation. Mechanistic models of enteric fermentation are constructed to represent physiological and microbial processes in the rumen and can be updated to characterize the dependency of AFA efficacy on basal diet and the impacts of AFA on fermentation. The objective of this article is to review the current state of rumen mechanistic modeling, contrasting the representation of key pools in extant models with a particular emphasis on representation of CH4 production. Additionally, we discuss the first rumen mechanistic models to include AFA and emphasize future model needs for improved representation of rumen dynamics under CH4-inhibition due to AFA supplementation, including the representation of microbial populations, rumen pH, fractional outflow rates, and thermodynamic control of fermentative pathways.