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Wireless farming can help to handle
data overload
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[JULY
1, 2004]
URBANA --
Many farmers are swamped with
all of the data they collect from yield monitors and field maps.
"But if farmers have no way to use this information, it means
nothing," said Qin Zhang, an agricultural engineer with the
University of Illinois.
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To solve the problem of data overload,
U of I researchers are developing a wireless information management
system that analyzes data and makes decisions automatically.
With the system developed by Zhang and
his colleagues, all of the data coming from sensors on combines or
tractors are transmitted wirelessly to a central information
processing center, where decisions are made. It's part of what they
call "infotronics," a strategy that combines information management
with the latest electronic advances.
Zhang and his fellow engineers first
tested this idea on the U of I South Farms with a self-guided John
Deere Gator tractor equipped with a GPS sensor and motion sensors.
Using a wireless link, the tractor sent its data to an information
processing center in the lab, and in a split second the tractor
received commands that guided it up and down the rows.
The information processing system
proved to be highly accurate in these early tests. Most of the time,
the self-guided tractor was no more than four inches off course, and
the farthest it was ever off was eight inches.
"The system works and it's in real
time," Zhang said.
Although researchers first tested this
system to direct a self-guided tractor through a field, Zhang said
its most useful application will be for fertilizer applicators or
pesticide sprayers. The information processing center would analyze
the data and field maps and then automatically adjust the sprayer
nozzles to vary the rate of chemical application according to the
needs of a specific segment of the field.
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Zhang said the information processing
center could be housed in a farmer's home or in a local farm service
agency, which would have the resources to maintain the system. An
information processing center would have much greater computing
power than computers on the equipment, making it better equipped to
handle all of the data.
According to Zhang, their experimental
information processing center, housed in the lab, can transmit
information to the tractor for a radius of two miles. But he added,
"As the technology improves, it will be able to reach up to 10 miles
or beyond."
He also noted that they should be able
to extend the radius well beyond 10 miles by networking farmers
together in a region.
Zhang is
hopeful about the concept of wireless farming. "All of the
technology exists," he said. What's needed now is to integrate the
technology with the information. And that's precisely what Zhang and
his colleagues are doing.
[University
of Illinois news release]
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