Research Progress on Mechanisms of Lighting Affecting the Reproduction of Male Poultry Breeders

Lighting is one of the most crucial environment factors for the organisms. The superior photonasty of poultry enable them to sensitize the lighting and translate the photon to biological signals that regulate the growth,reproduction and behaviors. In the modern poultry industry, providing the optimized lighting environment has been an important management strategy for the enhancement of the animal performance. In the recent years, with the development of poultry artificial insemination technology,semen process,package and conservation, housing the male breeders separately from the females is getting popular. Therefore,the finer lighting environment for the males is valuable for their reproduction performance. The recent progresses on poultry photoreceptor,hormones involved in the light-sex signal transduction, and the effect of lighting regimen, light intensity,and spectrum on the reproduction of male poultry breeders were summarized in this review,aiming at providing the basis for the future study and industry application.