Sensors In Agriculture Volume 1

Agriculture requires technical solutions for increasing production while lessening environmental impact by reducing the application of agro-chemicals and increasing the use of environmentally friendly management practices. A benefit of this is the reduction of production costs. Sensor technologies produce tools to achieve the abovementioned goals. The explosive technological advances and developments in recent years have enormously facilitated the attainment of these objectives, removing many barriers for their implementation, including the reservations expressed by farmers. Precision agriculture and ‘smart farming’ are emerging areas where sensor-based technologies play an important role. Farmers, researchers, and technical manufacturers are joining their efforts to find efficient solutions, improvements in production, and reductions in costs. This book brings together recent research and developments concerning novel sensors and their applications in agriculture. Sensors in agriculture are based on the requirements of farmers, according to the farming operations that need to be addressed.

Sensing Approaches for Precision Agriculture aims to bring together the ‘state of the art’ of the most popular sensing techniques and the current state of research on the application of sensors in Precision Agriculture (PA). Sensing is of great value in PA because it provides cheap and immediate data for management. This book gives a broad overview of sensing in PA and a coherent introduction for new professionals and research scientists. Readers are introduced to the potential applications of a range of different sensors, how they should be used properly and their limitations for use in PA. Chapters on specific topics and case studies provide depth and enable implementation of the methods by users. A general introduction about sensing techniques in PA is followed by Chapters 2–9 on the most important specific techniques in sensing and Chapters 10–13 include mini-case studies, each showing cutting-edge applications for different sensing methods. Finally, there is an Epilogue on how we expect sensors and analysis to develop.

Agriculture requires technical solutions for increasing production while lessening environmental impact by reducing the application of agro-chemicals and increasing the use of environmentally friendly management practices. A benefit of this is the reduction of production costs. Sensor technologies produce tools to achieve the abovementioned goals. The explosive technological advances and developments in recent years have enormously facilitated the attainment of these objectives, removing many barriers for their implementation, including the reservations expressed by farmers. Precision agriculture and 'smart farming' are emerging areas where sensor-based technologies play an important role. Farmers, researchers, and technical manufacturers are joining their efforts to find efficient solutions, improvements in production, and reductions in costs. This book brings together recent research and developments concerning novel sensors and their applications in agriculture. Sensors in agriculture are based on the requirements of farmers, according to the farming operations that need to be addressed.

Nanosensors for Smart Agriculture covers new breakthroughs in smart agriculture, highlighting new technologies, such as the internet of things, big data and artificial intelligence. In addition, the book provides the many advantages of nanosensors over their micro counterparts, such as lower power consumption, higher sensitivity, lower concentration of analytes, and smaller interaction distances between the object and sensor. Sections provide information on fundamental design concepts and emerging applications of nanosensors in smart agriculture. The book highlights how, when cultivating soil, nanosensors and their wireless networks can be used for soil quality monitoring (moisture/herbicides/organic compound/trace metals monitoring in soil, etc. Other applications cover how smart nanosensors can be used for virus detection and hygiene/pathogen controls in livestocks, their use as active transport tracking devices for smart tracking and tracing, and other various applications, such as (i) nanochips for identity (radio frequency identification), (ii) food inspection, (iii) intelligent food packaging, and (iv) smart storage. This is an important reference source for materials scientists and agricultural engineers who are looking to understand more about how nanosensor technology can be used to create more efficient and sustainable agricultural systems. Outlines the fabrication and fundamental design concepts of nanosensors for agricultural applications Explains how nanosensors are being used throughout the agricultural cycle – from crop growth to food manufacturing Assesses major challenges surrounding the application of nanosensors to agricultural applications in mass scale

Nanosensors enable us to specifically detect pollutants that can adversely affect the quality of life. This book covers the design, application and safety aspects of nanomaterial-based sensors. The focus is on nanosensors useful for application in Environment, Food and Agriculture. It discusses in detail the advances in nanosensor design and application. It also emphasizes on the strategies for toxicity assessment and safe use of nanosensors.

Crop models and remote sensing techniques have been combined and applied in agriculture and crop estimation on local and regional scales, or worldwide, based on the simultaneous development of crop models and remote sensing. The literature shows that many new remote sensing sensors and valuable methods have been developed for the retrieval of canopy state variables and soil properties from remote sensing data for assimilating the retrieved variables into crop models. At the same time, remote sensing has been used in a staggering number of applications for agriculture. This book sets the context for remote sensing and modelling for agricultural systems as a mean to minimize the environmental impact, while increasing production and productivity. The eighteen papers published in this Special Issue, although not representative of all the work carried out in the field of Remote Sensing for agriculture and crop modeling, provide insight into the diversity and the complexity of developments of RS applications in agriculture. Five thematic focuses have emerged from the published papers: yield estimation, land cover mapping, soil nutrient balance, time-specific management zone delineation and the use of UAV as agricultural aerial sprayers. All contributions exploited the use of remote sensing data from different platforms (UAV, Sentinel, Landsat, QuickBird, CBERS, MODIS, WorldView), their assimilation into crop models (DSSAT, AQUACROP, EPIC, DELPHI) or on the synergy of Remote Sensing and modeling, applied to cardamom, wheat, tomato, sorghum, rice, sugarcane and olive. The intended audience is researchers and postgraduate students, as well as those outside academia in policy and practice.

Remote Sensing in Precision Agriculture: Transforming Scientific Advancement into Innovation compiles the latest applications of remote sensing in agriculture using spaceborne, airborne and drones’ geospatial data. The book presents case studies, new algorithms and the latest methods surrounding crop sown area estimation, determining crop health status, assessment of vegetation dynamics, crop diseases identification, crop yield estimation, soil properties, drone image analysis for crop damage assessment, and other issues in precision agriculture. This book is ideal for those seeking to explore and implement remote sensing in an effective and efficient manner with its compendium of scientifically and technologically sound information. Presents a well-integrated collection of chapters, with quality, consistency and continuity Provides the latest RS techniques in Precision Agriculture that are addressed by leading experts Includes detailed, yet geographically global case studies that can be easily understood, reproduced or implemented Covers geospatial data, with codes available through shared links

Agricultural Internet of Things and Decision Support for Smart Farming reveals how a set of key enabling technologies (KET) related to agronomic management, remote and proximal sensing, data mining, decision-making and automation can be efficiently integrated in one system. Chapters cover how KETs enable real-time monitoring of soil conditions, determine real-time, site-specific requirements of crop systems, help develop a decision support system (DSS) aimed at maximizing the efficient use of resources, and provide planning for agronomic inputs differentiated in time and space. This book is ideal for researchers, academics, post-graduate students and practitioners who want to embrace new agricultural technologies. Presents the science behind smart technologies for agricultural management Reveals the power of data science and how to extract meaningful insights from big data on what is most suitable based on individual time and space Proves how advanced technologies used in agriculture practices can become site-specific, locally adaptive, operationally feasible and economically affordable