Internet of Things in agriculture, recent advances and future challenges

Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) can be used in agriculture to provide farmers with a large amount of information. Precision agriculture (PA) is a management strategy that employs information technology to improve quality and production. Utilizing wireless sensor technologies and management tools can lead to a highly effective, green agriculture. Based on PA management, the same routine to a crop regardless of site environments can be avoided. From several perspectives, field management can improve PA, including the provision of adequate nutrients for crops and the wastage of pesticides for the effective control of weeds, pests, and diseases. This review outlines the recent applications of WSNs in agriculture research as well as classifies and compares various wireless communication protocols, the taxonomy of energy-efficient and energy harvesting techniques for WSNs that can be used in agricultural monitoring systems, and comparison between early research works on agriculture-based WSNs. The challenges and limitations of WSNs in the agricultural domain are explored, and several power reduction and agricultural management techniques for long-term monitoring are highlighted. These approaches may also increase the number of opportunities for processing Internet of Things (IoT) data.

https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/17/8/1781/pdf

Energy-Efficient Wireless Sensor Networks for Precision Agriculture: A Review.

Internet of Things (IoT) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are two hot technologies utilized in cultivation fields, which transform traditional farming practices into a new era of precision agriculture. In this paper, we perform a survey of the last research on IoT and UAV technology applied in agriculture. We describe the main principles of IoT technology, including intelligent sensors, IoT sensor types, networks and protocols used in agriculture, as well as IoT applications and solutions in smart farming. Moreover, we present the role of UAV technology in smart agriculture, by analyzing the applications of UAVs in various scenarios, including irrigation, fertilization, use of pesticides, weed management, plant growth monitoring, crop disease management, and field-level phenotyping. Furthermore, the utilization of UAV systems in complex agricultural environments is also analyzed. Our conclusion is that IoT and UAV are two of the most important technologies that transform traditional cultivation practices into a new perspective of intelligence in precision agriculture.

Internet of Things (IoT) and Agricultural Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in smart farming: A comprehensive review

Comprehensive Survey of Image Steganography: Techniques, Evaluations, and Trends in Future Research

Spread spectrum systems

https://www.jart.icat.unam.mx/index.php/jart/article/download/762/726

Wireless sensor networks: A survey on monitoring water quality

Variable Structure System with Sliding Mode Controller

Increasing usage of petroleum-based insulating oils in electrical apparatus has led to increase in pollution and, at the same time, the oils adversely affect the life of electrical apparatus. This increases the demand of Mineral Oil (MO), which is on the verge of extinction and leads to conducting tests on natural esters. This work discusses dielectric endurance of Marula Oil (MRO), a natural ester modified using Conductive Nano Particle (CNP) to replace petroleum-based dielectric oils for power transformer applications. The Al2O3 is a CNP that has a melting point of 2072 °C and a low charge relaxation time that allows time to quench free electrons during electrical discharge. Al2O3 is blended with the MRO and Mineral Oil (MO) in different concentrations. The measured dielectric properties are transformed into mathematical equations using the Lagrange interpolation polynomial functions and compared with the predicted values either using Gaussian or Fourier distribution functions. Addition of Al2O3 indicates that 0.75 g/L in MRO has an 80% survival rate and 20% hazard rate compared to MO which has 50% survival rate and 50% hazard rate. Considering the measured or interpolated values and the predicted values, they are used to identify the MRO and MO’s optimum concentration produces better results. The test result confirms the enhancement of the breakdown voltage up to 64%, kinematic viscosity is lowered by up to 40% at 110 °C, and flash/fire points of MRO after Al2O3 treatment enhanced to 14% and 23%. Hence the endurance of Al2O3 in MRO proves to be effective against electrical, physical and thermal stress.

Investigation of survival/hazard rate of natural ester treated with al2o3 nanoparticle for power transformer liquid dielectric

Steganography is the science of invisible communication that employs different useful applications. In most of the current steganography techniques, information hiding modifies almost all the cover image, which may negatively affect the visual quality of the image and increase the possibility of losing data after the possible attacks. To solve such a problem, this paper presents a new region based steganography technique, which hides data in the robust regions of the image. Two promising approaches have been used to detect the robust regions in the image: Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT) and Speeded Up Robust Features (SURF). The robustness of the two algorithms has been tested against different types of attacks. Results showed that SURF based algorithm is better when detecting the robust regions correctly. Its accuracy is higher in retrieving the embedded data and that the visual quality of the embedded image is high for both algorithms.

/pdf/a-comparison-between-using-sift-and-surf-for-characteristic-432slmnl3c.pdf

A Comparison between Using SIFT and SURF for Characteristic Region Based Image Steganography

Steganography is the art and science of invisible communication. It is employed in different useful applications, like, safe circulation of secret data and Medical Imaging Systems. For most of the current steganography techniques, information hiding modifies almost all the cover components, which may negatively affect the visual quality of the image and increase the possibility of losing data after the possible attacks. This paper presents a new region based steganography technique, which hides data in the robust regions of the image. First, the Speeded-Up Robust Features (SURF) is used to find the most robust regions in the image. Then, the data embedding is achieved in a content-based manner by modifying the wavelet transform coefficients of those robust regions. Experimental results show the proposed algorithm allows hiding data invisibly with an accurate retrieval in the presence of lossy compression or noise. Moreover, the visual quality of the embedded image is high.

Abid Yahya

Papers

Wireless sensor networks: A survey on monitoring water quality

Variable Structure System with Sliding Mode Controller

Investigation of survival/hazard rate of natural ester treated with al2o3 nanoparticle for power transformer liquid dielectric

A Comparison between Using SIFT and SURF for Characteristic Region Based Image Steganography

Characteristic region based image steganography using Speeded-Up Robust Features technique