The Digital Agricultural Knowledge and Information System(DAKIS):Employing digitalisation to encourage diversified and multifunctional agricultural systems

Multifunctional and diversified agriculture can address diverging pressures and demands by simultaneously enhancing productivity,biodiversity,and the provision of ecosystem services.The use of digital technologies can support this by designing and managing resource-efficient and context-specific agricultural systems.We present the Digital Agricultural Knowledge and Information System(DAKIS)to demonstrate an approach that employs digital technologies to enable decision-making towards diversified and sustainable agriculture.To develop the DAKIS,we specified,together with stakeholders,requirements for a knowledge-based decision-support tool and reviewed the literature to identify limitations in the current generation of tools.The results of the review point towards recurring challenges regarding the consideration of ecosystem services and biodiversity,the capacity to foster communication and cooperation between farmers and other actors,and the ability to link multiple spatiotemporal scales and sustainability levels.To overcome these challenges,the DAKIS provides a digital platform to support farmers'decision-making on land use and management via an integrative spatiotemporally explicit approach that analyses a wide range of data from various sources.The approach integrates remote and in situ sensors,artificial intelligence,modelling,stakeholder-stated demand for biodiversity and ecosystem services,and participatory sustainability impact assessment to address the diverse drivers affecting agricultural land use and management design,including natural and agronomic factors,economic and policy considerations,and socio-cultural preferences and settings.Ultimately,the DAKIS embeds the consideration of ecosystem services,biodiversity,and sustainability into farmers'decision-making and enables learning and progress towards site-adapted small-scale multifunctional and diversified agriculture while simultaneously supporting farmers'objectives and societal demands.

Simulation software and virtual environments for acceleration of agricultural robotics:Features highlights and performance comparison

Research efforts for development of agricultural robots that can effectively perform tedious field tasks have grown significantly in the past decade.Agricultural robots are complex systems that require interdisciplinary collaborations between different research groups for effective task delivery in unstructured crops and plants environments.With the exception of milking robots,the extensive research works that have been carried out in the past two decades for adaptation of robotics in agriculture have not yielded a commercial product to date.To accelerate this pace,simulation approach and evaluation methods in virtual environments can provide an affordable and reliable framework for experimenting with different sensing and acting mechanisms in order to verify the performance functionality of the robot in dynamic scenarios.This paper reviews several professional simulators and custom-built virtual environments that have been used for agricultural robotic applications.The key features and performance efficiency of three selected simulators were also compared.A simulation case study was demonstrated to highlight some of the powerful functionalities of the Virtual Robot Experimentation Platform.Details of the objects and scenes were presented as the proof-of-concept for using a completely simulated robotic platform and sensing systems in a virtual citrus orchard.It was shown that the simulated workspace can provide a configurable and modular prototype robotic system that is capable of adapting to several field conditions and tasks through easy testing and debugging of control algorithms with zero damage risk to the real robot and to the actual equipment.This review suggests that an open-source software platform for agricultural robotics will significantly accelerate effective collaborations between different research groups for sharing existing workspaces,algorithms,and reusing the materials.

Short-Term and Long-Term Effects of Natural and Artificial Carbonaceous Substrates on Greenhouse Gas Fluxes

The emissions of two greenhouse gases(GHG),carbon dioxide(CO_(2))and nitrous oxide(N2O),from six substrates with different carbonaceous content were compared in short and long-term incubation experiments.Three natural soils and three artificial chars were mixed with carbon(C)poor soil(Cambisol)to simulate real conditions after application of char to farmland.The natural soils were a Cambisol,an Anthrosol and a Histosol with C contents of 1.3%,4.4%and 13.2%,respectively.The three chars produced through thermal conversion of wood chips by hydrothermal carbonisation(HTC),fluidized bed gasification and pyrolysis had C contents of 56.9%,75.4%and 79.9%,respectively.Emission rates of CO_(2)and N2O from the rewetted substrates were measured by gas chromatography over a short time of 72 h and over a long period of nearly two years.The short-term CO_(2)emissions from the natural soils showed a clear relationship to their C content.The emission rate for the Histosol/Cambisol mixture was three times higher than that for the pure Cambisol,77.1 vs.23.5 mg CO_(2)-C kg^(-1)organic matter(OM)per hour.The C emission rates for the char/Cambisol mixtures were much lower,ranging between 3.0 and 9.1 mg CO_(2)-C kg OM^(-1)h^(-1),and did not correspond to their total C contents.Comparison between the two incubation lengths showed that the long-term CO_(2)emission rates were generally one order of magnitude lower than the short-term rates.The final emission rates for natural substrates over a period of two years were still twice those for artificial char substrates,between 2.2–3.5 mg CO_(2)-C kg OM^(-1)h^(-1)and 1.3–1.8 mg CO_(2)-C kg OM^(-1)h^(-1),respectively.Although the contents of total nitrogen(Ntot)and extractable nitrogen(Nmin)were considerable in the chars under study,enhanced N2O release was not observed in the incubation experiments.Instead,N2O emission rates in the three mixtures of chars and Cambisol were lower by one to two orders of magnitude compared to the pure Cambisol in short-term incubations.Even long-term N2O emissions were 5 to 9 times lower.The highest degree of N2O reduction was found for the HTC char.Because of the high global warming potential of N2O,this positive effect of chars may play an important role in mitigating emissions of CO_(2)equivalents.Both CO_(2)and N2O must be taken into account when balancing GHG emitted after chars(biochar,gasifier char,HTC char)are applied to soil.

Research and development in agricultural robotics:A perspective of digital farming

Digital farming is the practice of modern technologies such as sensors,robotics,and data analysis for shifting from tedious operations to continuously automated processes.This paper reviews some of the latest achievements in agricultural robotics,specifically those that are used for autonomous weed control,field scouting,and harvesting.Object identification,task planning algorithms,digitalization and optimization of sensors are highlighted as some of the facing challenges in the context of digital farming.The concepts of multi-robots,human-robot collaboration,and environment reconstruction from aerial images and ground-based sensors for the creation of virtual farms were highlighted as some of the gateways of digital farming.It was shown that one of the trends and research focuses in agricultural field robotics is towards building a swarm of small scale robots and drones that collaborate together to optimize farming inputs and reveal denied or concealed information.For the case of robotic harvesting,an autonomous framework with several simple axis manipulators can be faster and more efficient than the currently adapted professional expensive manipulators.While robots are becoming the inseparable parts of the modern farms,our conclusion is that it is not realistic to expect an entirely automated farming system in the future.

Prediction of the biogas production using GA and ACO input features selection method for ANN model

This paper presents a fast and reliable approach to analyze the biogas production process with respect to the biogas production rate.The experimental data used for the developed models included 15 process variables measured at an agricultural biogas plant in Germany.In this context,the concentration of volatile fatty acids,total solids,volatile solids acid detergent fibre,acid detergent lignin,neutral detergent fibre,ammonium nitrogen,hydraulic retention time,and organic loading rate were used.Artificial neural networks(ANN)were established to predict the biogas production rate.An ant colony optimization and genetic algorithms were implemented to perform the variable selection.They identified the significant process variables,reduced the model dimension and improved the prediction capacity of the ANN models.The best prediction of the biogas production rate was obtained with an error of prediction of 6.24%and a coefficient of determination of R2=0.9.

Modification of colorimetric method based digital soil test kit for determination of macronutrients in oil palm plantation

It is the need of time that oil palm farmers must perform the spatially planned soil analysis to know about the fertilizer sufficient and deficient zones of land.Colorimetric method is a suitable and fast solution of soil analysis for NPK determination using the digital soil test kit.NPK determination procedure with a digital soil test kit was undefined for oil palm.Furthermore,the digital soil test kit determines the passage of light through an opaque medium of soil solution with a specified reagent.Therefore,environmental light may interfere leading to wrong results of NPK measurement.Likewise,this equipment was non-incorporable with the controller of any VRT fertilizer applicator.In this research,these issues were addressed and the NPK measurement procedure was defined for oil palm plantation by modifying the‘soil to water’ratio in sample soil solution with an optimum environmental light range of 18-23 W/m^(2).‘Soil to water’ratios were found for nitrogen,phosphorus and potassium as 0.31 to 5.00,1.00 to 5.00 and 4.50 to 5.00,respectively to fit the requirement of NPK for oil palm in the prescribed range of the equipment.Validation study of modified digital soil test kit showed that 91.7%N,89.6%P and 93.8%K results of modified digital soil test kit were matched with analytical laboratory method.Thus,the reliability of NPK results using digital soil test kit was enhanced,making the kit incorporable with the controller of variable rate fertilizer applicator through remote monitoring based data acquisition system.The outcome of this research can be used in the development of an IoT network data fusion for dynamic assessment of the NPK variation in the soil and nutrient management in oil palm plantations.

Advances in greenhouse automation and controlled environment agriculture:A transition to plant factories and urban agriculture

Greenhouse cultivation has evolved from simple covered rows of open-fields crops to highly sophisticated controlled environment agriculture(CEA)facilities that projected the image of plant factories for urban agriculture.The advances and improvements in CEA have promoted the scientific solutions for the efficient production of plants in populated cities and multi-story buildings.Successful deployment of CEA for urban agriculture requires many components and subsystems,as well as the understanding of the external influencing factors that should be systematically considered and integrated.This review is an attempt to highlight some of the most recent advances in greenhouse technology and CEA in order to raise the awareness for technology transfer and adaptation,which is necessary for a successful transition to urban agriculture.This study reviewed several aspects of a high-tech CEA system including improvements in the frame and covering materials,environment perception and data sharing,and advanced microclimate control and energy optimization models.This research highlighted urban agriculture and its derivatives,including vertical farming,rooftop greenhouses and plant factories which are the extensions of CEA and have emerged as a response to the growing population,environmental degradation,and urbanization that are threatening food security.Finally,several opportunities and challenges have been identified in implementing the integrated CEA and vertical farming for urban agriculture.

Review of research progress on soil moisture sensor technology

Soil moisture is directly related to the amount of irrigation in agriculture and influences the yield of crops.Accordingly,a soil moisture sensor is an important tool for measuring soil moisture content.In this study,the previous research conducted in recent 2-3 decades on soil moisture sensors was reviewed and the principles of commonly used soil moisture sensor and their various applications were summarized.Furthermore,the advantages,disadvantages,and influencing factors of various measurement methods employed were compared and analyzed.The improvements were presented by several scholars have established the major applications and performance levels of soil moisture sensors,thereby setting the course for future development.These studies indicated that soil moisture sensors in the future should be developed to achieve high-precision,low-cost,non-destructive,automated,and highly integrated systems.Also,it was indicated that future studies should involve the development of specialized sensors for different applications and scenarios.This review research aimed to provide a certain reference for application departments and scientific researchers in the process of selecting soil moisture sensor products and measuring soil moisture.

Short-Term Response of Soil Respiration to Addition of Chars:Impact of Fermentation Post-Processing and Mineral Nitrogen

The biodegradability of chars derived from pyrolysis and hydrothermal carbonisation(HTC) was studied in short-term dynamic incubation experiments under controlled conditions. Carbon dioxide C(CO2) emissions from soil-char mixtures in combination with solid digestate or mineral nitrogen(N) fertiliser were measured in dynamic chambers for 10 d. Compared to the original material(maize straw), pyrolysis and HTC chars showed significantly lower CO2 emissions and slower decay dynamics; and compared to the soil control, HTC char increased soil respiration to a significant extent, while pyrolysis char did not. The addition of mineral N resulted in a delayed respiration dynamics for HTC char, while the addition of digestate resulted in an increase in the respired CO2 for pyrolysis char and a decrease for HTC char. For the first time, a peculiar two-stage decay kinetics was observed for HTC char,indicating a highly inhomogeneous substrate consisting at least of two C pools.

Investigation of grain mass flow in a mixed flow dryer

The numerical modeling of grain drying is a topic of great relevance to post-harvest engineering. The required type of drying process depends on the quantity of grain to be dried and the required quality of the grain. The choice of the drying system depends on the operating parameters of the drying process. The granular flow pattern of the material exerts a significant influence on the drying process. Post-harvest drying of grain is essential for better storage, handling, and processing. Therefore, it is important to know the material behavior that controls the particle flow patterns of grain in the drying equipment to guarantee the product quality and to optimize the drying process conditions. The discrete element method （DEM） was applied to investigate the particle flow pattern of wheat through a mixed-flow dryer （MFD） without airflow, and the findings were compared with experimental results in this work. The investigations were performed using dry wheat with 14 wb% moisture content.

Evaluating system of rice intensification using a modified transplanter:A smart farming solution toward sustainability of paddy fields in Malaysia

This paper presents the study reports on evaluating a new transplanting operation by taking into accounts the interactions between soil,plant,and machine in line with the System of Rice Intensification(SRI)practices.The objective was to modify planting claw(kuku-kambing)of a paddy transplanter in compliance with SRI guidelines to determine the best planting spacing(S),seed rate(G)and planting pattern that results in a maximum number of seedling,tillers per hill,and yield.Two separate experiments were carried out in two different paddy fields,one to determine the best planting spacing(S=4 levels:s_(1)=0.16 m×0.3 m,s_(2)=0.18 m×0.3 m,s_(3)=0.21 m×0.3 m,and s_(4)=0.24 m×0.3 m)for a specific planting pattern(row mat or scattered planting pattern),and the other to determine the best combination of spacing with seed rate treatments(G=2 levels:g1=75 g/tray,and g2=240 g/tray).Main SRI management practices such as soil characteristics of the sites,planting depth,missing hill,hill population,the number of seedling per hill,and yield components were evaluated.Results of two-way analysis of variance with three replications showed that spacing,planting pattern and seed rate affected the number of one-seedling in all experiment.It was also observed that the increase in spacing resulted in more tillers and more panicle per plant,however hill population and sterility ratio increased with the decrease in spacing.While the maximum number of panicles were resulted from scattered planting at s_(4)=0.24 m×0.3 m spacing with the seed rate of g1=75 g/tray,the maximum number of one seedling were observed at s_(4)=0.16 m×0.3 m.The highest and lowest yields were obtained from 75 g seeds per tray scattered and 70 g seeds per tray scattered treatment respectively.For all treatments,the result clearly indicates an increase in yield with an increase in spacing.

Influence of the number of flights on the dilute phase ratio in flighted rotating drums by PTV measurements and DEM simulations

Particle distribution in the cross-section of the flighted rotating drum(FRD)is critical to the analysis of heat and mass transfer between gas and solids.In this work,the particle tracking velocimetry(PTV)method is applied to study the influence of the number of flights on the particle motion in FRDs.The drum,installed with 1,4,8,or 12 rectangular flights,is filled with plastic balls to 15%and operated at various rotating speeds ranging from 10 rpm to 30 rpm.The results show that the number of flights has different effects on the holdup ratio and cascading rate of single flight and active flights.With 8 and 12 flights,the FRD produces a larger and more stable particle ratio of the dilute phase.Moreover,DEM simulations agree with PTV measurements,whereas literature models show significant deviations.

Oxygen tolerance capacity of upflow anaerobic solid-state(UASS) with anaerobic filter(AF) system

In order to investigate the oxygen tolerance capacity of upflow anaerobic solid-state（UASS）with anaerobic filter（AF） system, the effect of microaeration on thermophilic anaerobic digestion of maize straw was investigated under batch conditions and in the UASS with AF system. Aeration intensities of 0–431 m L O2/gvswere conducted as pretreatment under batch conditions. Aeration pretreatment obviously enhanced anaerobic digestion and an aeration intensity of 431 m L O2/gvsincreased the methane yield by 82.2%. Aeration intensities of 0–355 m L O2/gvswere conducted in the process liquor circulation of the UASS with AF system. Dissolved oxygen（DO） of UASS and AF reactors kept around 1.39 ±0.27 and 0.99 ± 0.38 mg/L, respectively. p H was relatively stable around 7.11 ± 0.04. Volatile fatty acids and soluble chemical oxygen demand concentration in UASS reactor were higher than those in AF reactor. Methane yield of the whole system was almost stable at 85 ± 7 m L/gvs as aeration intensity increased step by step. The UASS with AF system showed good oxygen tolerance capacity.

Modelling air change rate of naturally ventilated dairy buildings using response surface methodology and numerical simulation

The air change rate(ACR)of naturally ventilated dairy buildings(NVDBs)plays an important part in the design and control of the ventilation system,as well as in the estimation of the gaseous emission rate.The objectives of this research were to model the ACR based on a quantitative investigation of the relationship between the ACR and its potential influencing factors,including the opening ratio(r),the building length to width ratio(a),the wind speed(U),and the wind direction(0).The investigations were performed using the response surface methodology integrated with the Box-Behnken design and Computational Fluid Dynamics(CFD)simulations.Three response surface models of the ACR of NVDBs were established for three opening ratio ranges of 5%-42.5%,42.5%-80%,and 5%-80%,respectively.It was found that the selection of the opening ratio range had almost no effect on the developed response surface models.The results showed that the ACR of NVDBs was not influenced by a,but was significantly affected by r,U,6,and interaction effects between every two of the three factors.The highest ACR was 6.7 s^(-1),6.0 s^(-1),and 4.0 s^(-1)when 0,U,and r was at their respective medium value while the rest parameters were at the highest values,indicating that the r played an important role in the value of ACR.It was concluded that in the prediction of the ACR of a building,the influences of both individual and interactional effects of 0,U,and r should be considered.