Agritech: Sensors system for plant health monitoring

Smart agriculture aims to improve food production and reduce the waste of water and chemicals by monitoring the crops with sensors.

Remote sensing and environmental sensing are commonly adopted to monitor crops. This research area focuses on directly monitoring the plants towards the concept of personalized farming. Direct and in-vivo monitoring of the crops can improve the information extracted and increase the impact of smart agriculture.

Understanding water needs and stress conditions of the crops at a very detailed level can improve crop yield and reduce the use of chemicals in agriculture. Here we monitor the stem impedance variations of the plants and relate those variations to the health status of the crop. Stem impedance is a promising alternative to complex sensors: simple electronics can be used to monitor this parameter.

Key features of the systems developed are wireless communication and ultra-low power consumption.

The final goal is to have small, flexible, and bio-degradable systems that can be used directly in the fields.

Erc Sector:

  • PE7_4 (Micro and nano) systems engineering
  • PE7_8 Networks (communication networks, networks of sensors, robots...)

Keywords:

  • Agricultural engineering
  • Wireless sensor networks
  • Plants direct monitoring
  • Precision agriculture

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