Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor Research Articles

Prototype Of Moisture Content Meter In Grain Using Esp32 Based On Spreadsheet

In the process period after the rice is harvested, the rice is then separated from the stalk and referred to as grain which will then be dried. The dried grain aims to reduce the water content, in measuring the water content of the grain, an effective and efficient measurement and database storage tool is needed for users to find out which grain is suitable for processing and can determine the quality of the water content of the grain. The method used in this research uses the RnD (Research And Development) method. In this test using capacitive soil moisture sensor and using database storage in the form of google spreadsheet. The capacitive soil moisture sensor is also calibrated with conventional measuring instruments (Grain Moisture Meter) to find out whether the sensor works properly and accurately. The results in this test found that all components are able to work properly and show an error value <1, the sample reading data will be sent to the database on google spreadsheet so that users can find out the data records in real time and detail.

Sistem Kontrol Kelembaban Tanah dan Penyiraman Otomatis Pada Tanaman Seledri (Apium graveolens L.) Yang Dipengaruhi Oleh Suhu Berbasis Mikrokontroler

A system of soil moisture control and automatic watering has been designed for celery (Apium graveolens L.) which is influenced by temperature and humidity based on a microcontroller. This system functions to water the plants automatically based on the soil moisture that has been set in the program. The system will provide information to the user when the soil moisture is more than 75%. The system consists of a DHT11 sensor as a temperature and humidity detector, a capacitive soil moisture sensor to detect soil moisture, a relay as a mini water pump switch for watering plants, red and green LEDs as indicator lights according to the measurement results of a capacitive soil moisture sensor and LCD. to display temperature, air humidity and soil moisture. The test results show that the tool can function properly, if the soil moisture is 75% the pump will start and the soil moisture ≥75 the pump will stop so that watering does not occur. The highest humidity obtained was 83% and the lowest temperature was 23°C with the condition that the plants did not look dry, while the highest temperature obtained was 30°C and the lowest humidity was 77% with the conditions that the plants looked dry.

IoT and fuzzy logic integration for improved substrate environment management in mushroom cultivation

The current era witnesses the advent of the Internet of Things (IoT), a transformative force giving rise to various technological innovations, most notably connected objects. This paradigm shift catalyzes the widespread adoption of autonomous decision-making systems, particularly in sectors like agriculture, where the aim is to amplify productivity. As a result of the agricultural domain, mushrooms have concurrently emerged as a significant component of daily diets, offering additional vitamins and flavor. Despite their popularity, cultivating mushrooms in open environments poses challenges in maintaining optimal environmental conditions, prompting numerous research efforts. Recognizing the inconsistencies in existing approaches to safeguard vital parameters in mushroom farms, this paper introduces an innovative system utilizing intelligent sensors whose real-time records are managed based on the fuzzy sets concept. These sensors, encompassing the Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor v1.2, DHT22 Sensor, Light Dependent Resistor (LDR sensor), and Passive Infrared Receiver (PIR sensor), collectively capture essential data for decision-making in mushroom farming. Employing fuzzy logic, the system addresses pivotal aspects such as substrate watering, environmental control, light management, and pest detection. Through experimental results, it becomes evident that the proposed system not only exemplifies the potential of IoT technologies in agriculture but also offers a comprehensive and efficient approach to real-time decision-making. By aggregating sensor data, the system proves instrumental in enhancing the quality and yield of mushroom crops, showcasing a promising trajectory for sustainable and technologically driven agricultural practices.

Rancang Bangun Sistem Penyiraman Otomatis pada Tanaman Sawi dengan Sistem Irigasi Tetes untuk Lahan Pertanian Lereng Gunung Ungaran

Cultivating mustard greens requires maintaining the ideal soil moisture level within the range of 50% to 70% Relative Humidity (RH). To fulfill water requirements and preserve soil moisture, irrigation processes are essential. Historically, farmers have employed manual irrigation methods, such as flooding entire agricultural fields, leading to water wastage and requiring significant labor. This research aims to develop an automated irrigation system based on soil conditions to assist farmers in the irrigation process. The automated irrigation system operates by responding to soil conditions. It initiates irrigation when the soil is dry and automatically ceases when the soil becomes adequately moist. This system utilizes Arduino as the central control unit, soil moisture sensors as input devices, an LCD for monitoring, and a water pump for distributing water to the agricultural fields through drip irrigation. The research methodology follows engineering design principles and encompasses three stages: design, installation, and implementation. The design phase involves creating the system, programming, and designing the drip irrigation system. Installation entails assembling the components of the automated irrigation system, while implementation involves deploying the system in agricultural fields and conducting tests. The research findings indicate that the automated irrigation system effectively irrigates when soil moisture falls below 50% and halts when it reaches 70%. Calibration tests reveal a 2% variance between the capacitive soil moisture sensor and the Soil Moisture Meter. The water requirement for a single mustard greens plant to reach the ideal soil moisture level (50-70% RH) is approximately 150 ml.

Multi-Frame Fringing Field Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor With Enhanced Sensitivity and Penetration Depth

Multi-Frame Fringing Field Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor With Enhanced Sensitivity and Penetration Depth

Assessment of Adequate Volumetric Water Content for Managing Farfugium japonicum (L.) Kitam. in the Indoor Gardens

Background and objective: The present research study aimed to investigate the optimum substrate volumetric water content (VWC) needed for <i>Farfugium japonicum</i> (L.) Kitam. to maintain its performance in the indoor garden.Methods: The threshold levels of substrate VWC were evaluated as 0.1, 0.2, 0.3 or 0.4 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> using an automated irrigation system with capacitance soil moisture sensors and datalogger. Plant growth and physiological responses were measured and analyzed at 10 weeks after treatment. Plant growth was investigated by measuring survival rate, plant height, leaf length, leaf width, leaf number, root length, fresh and dry weight of shoot and root. Physiological responses were observed by analyzing antioxidant enzymes (SOD, POD) and antioxidants (MDA, proline), maximum quantum yield (Fv/Fm) and total chlorophyll contents.Results: The results of drought tolerance measurement by the treatment group showed that the overall growth was the highest in the 0.3 and 0.4 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatment plot and the lowest in the 0.1 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatment plot. Under the droughtstressed condition of the 0.2 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatment, growth was not as efficient as the 0.3 and 0.4 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatments due to the relatively higher moisture content, but there was no statistical difference between the 0.3 and 0.4 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatments in the maximum quantum yield (Fv/Fm) and also total chlorophyll content. Furthermore, for antioxidant activities, SOD, POD, and MDA showed high values, but no statistical differences were found among treatments except for the 0.1 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> treatment, which was under severe drought stress in terms of proline.Conclusion: Overall, the results indicate that <i>Farfugium japonicum</i> (L.) Kitam., has a tolerance to drought, and for managing indoor gardens the adequate soil moisture content for the growth is at least 0.2 m<sup>3</sup>⋅m<sup>-3</sup> assuming the use of identical substrate in this experiment.

Re-Calibration of Model-Based Capacitive Sensor for IoT Soil Moisture Measurements

Low-cost automatic irrigation systems require quality calibrated soil moisture sensors. The sensor is an indirect method of soil moisture measurement. The sensor works based on the change in the dielectric constant. So, it requires to be calibrated in terms of the soil water content. Polynomial and linear models are frequently used to calibrate soil moisture sensor data in the gravimetric test method. However, computational effort is required. This study aims to obtain a sensor calibration application that can provide the best model of the available models for model-based capacitive soil moisture sensor. This research was conducted using primary data from gravimetric test experiment on Internet of things (IoT) based soil moisture sensor. Web-based re-calibration application produced best model based on adjusted R Squared. Finally, model-based capacitive soil moisture sensor set up using best model coefficient. The results show that the web-based re-calibration application can provide the best model for model-based capacitive soil moisture sensor. Based on gravimetric test experiments and web applications, the best model is a polynomial regression model order 3 with 0.945 adjusted R Squared. The model predicted value for soil moisture is in the range 0 – 1.2 for raw sensor data values of 100 – 530. When the model coefficient configured in capacitive soil moisture sensor and Blynk application, soil moisture measurement can be done via mobile phone in real time.

Influence of the biochar application on the thermal properties of soddy-podzolic soil and on the energy balance fluxes of spring wheat in the Leningrad region under various soil moisture conditions

The article presents the results of a field experiment to assess the effect of pre-sowing application of the biochar on the thermal properties of the arable horizon of soddy-podzolic sandy loam soil, on the energy balance components, on the crop surface temperature and on the leaves temperature of spring wheat (variety “Daria”) under various conditions of soil moisture in 2022. The experiment took place at the Menkovo Experimental Station of the Agrophysical Research Institute, located in the Gatchinsky District of the Leningrad Region. The experiment included the plot with the biochar application at the dose of 21.9 t ha-1 and the control plot. The soil thermal properties were measured by the heat pulse method. The components of the energy balance were determined using agrometeorological measurements, radiation balance measurements, crop surface temperature, and phenological measurements. The crop surface temperature was measured by a non-contact method using pyrometers. The soil moisture conditions and available water for wheat were characterized by volumetric soil moisture and evapotranspiration. The volumetric soil moisture was measured using a capacitive soil moisture sensor. The evapotranspiration was determined using the residual term of the energy balance equation through the latent heat flux. According to the results of field experiments, a significant effect (p < 0.05) of the biochar application on the soil thermal properties was found, however, under different moisture conditions, the effect was multidirectional. At zero soil moisture, the biochar application reduced thermal conductivity by 29.7%, reduced volumetric heat capacity by 18.5%, reduced diffusivity by 13.7%, and reduced thermal inertia by 24.3%. Under the conditions of field capacity, the biochar application increased thermal conductivity by 9.4%, reduced volumetric heat capacity by 2.6%, increased diffusivity by 12.3%, and increased thermal inertia by 3.2%. The biochar application significantly (p < 0.05) increased the turbulent heat flux – by 35.5%, which is due to an increase in the crop surface temperature (by 6.4%). Resulting from the decrease in soil evaporation, the biochar application reduced the latent heat flux by 17.0%, and the evapotranspiration by 13.9%. Leaf temperature is related to transpiration. Transpiration can increase when biochar is applied on light-textured soils due to an increase in soil water capacity. The biochar application did not result in significant changes of leaf temperature. The study results are confirmed by numerous articles of both foreign and Russian researchers.

DEVELOPMENT OF AUTOMATIC IRRIGATION SYSTEM WITH SOLAR ENERGY-BASED TELEGRAM NOTIFICATION

This study aims to produce an irrigation system development product using Wemos D1 as an irrigation control system, monitoring the state of soil moisture in stages and the state of the water pump by sending data periodically through the Telegram Messenger application. The research was conducted using the R&D (Research and Development) method and the prototype development model. The development procedure includes the stages of needs analysis, system design and design, making system prototypes, testing and validation stages. The results of the Black Box test obtained a percentage of 100% indicating that the prototype was feasible to use. Testing the working system of the tool where on the results of Testing Tool Conditions the Water Pump can work well, the Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor can detect dry soil moisture when <20% and the soil is wet> 20%, and the HC-SR04 Ultrasonic Sensor test can be used from 2 cm up to 22 cm as a reading of the tank contents. The results of testing user satisfaction with 20 respondents obtained a percentage of 90% in the very good category and 10% in the good category.

Development of semi-automatic recalibration system and curve-fit models for smart soil moisture sensor

Reliable measurement of soil moisture is one of the primary requirements for agriculture, irrigation management, and the study of soil–water dynamics. To improve the accuracy of a smart soil moisture sensor beyond the manufacturer's calibration, there is a need for soil-specific recalibration and improved sensor models. This paper discusses the development of a semi-automatic virtual instrumentation system integrated with a standard gravimetric method for soil-specific recalibration of a relatively new, low-cost capacitive soil moisture sensor, SoilWatch 10, in loamy–sandy soil. Using dual sensor with confidence-weighted averaging sensor fusion method, variance in the raw sensor readings is minimized. Further, the pre-processed recalibration data is used to develop linear, polynomial, and optimized 3-layer FFBP-NN (feedforward backpropagation neural network) direct and inverse models of the sensor. Performance evaluation of the models indicate that goodness of fit and accuracy of the FBNN models is the highest, followed by the polynomial and linear models.

IoT-Based Watering, Control, and Monitoring System for Tomato Plants Using Wemos D1 Mini

The growth of plant tomatoes is influenced by several factors, such as temperature, humidity, land, and rain. This study aimed to design the watering, control, and monitoring system for plants tomatoes with IoT-based using Wemos D1 Mini. The equipment is designed for sprinkling the plant tomatoes in a pot based on the response of a capacitive soil moisture sensor. The temperature was monitored using the DS18B20 sensor, and the presence of rain was determined using the raindrop sensor. On top of the equipment, an automatic on-off roof was built. This equipment was integrated with the website of Thingspeak and the Blynk application. The test results show that the design in this study could control the pump based on soil humidity with a control value of 60%. Furthermore, the built roof automatically works when detecting the temperature (higher or lower than 28°C) and the presence of rain.

Calibration of an Arduino-based low-cost capacitive soil moisture sensor for smart agriculture

Abstract Agriculture faces several challenges to use the available resources in a more environmentally sustainable manner. One of the most significant is to develop sustainable water management. The modern Internet of Things (IoT) techniques with real-time data collection and visualisation can play an important role in monitoring the readily available moisture in the soil. An automated Arduino-based low-cost capacitive soil moisture sensor has been calibrated and developed for data acquisition. A sensor- and soil-specific calibration was performed for the soil moisture sensors (SKU:SEN0193 - DFROBOT, Shanghai, China). A Repeatability and Reproducibility study was conducted by range of mean methods on clay loam, sandy loam and silt loam soil textures. The calibration process was based on the data provided by the capacitive sensors and the continuously and parallelly measured soil moisture content by the thermogravimetric method. It can be stated that the response of the sensors to changes in soil moisture differs from each other, which was also greatly influenced by different soil textures. Therefore, the calibration according to soil texture was required to ensure adequate measurement accuracy. After the calibration, it was found that a polynomial calibration function (R2 ≥ 0.89) was the most appropriate way for modelling the behaviour of the sensors at different soil textures.

Development of an IoT-based automatic fertigation system

Fertigation supplies water and liquid fertilizer through the same channel to plants. Using drip irrigation set up for fertigation allows the root zone of the plant to be continuously supplied with nutrients and water throughout the farm season. Conventionally, fertigated systems are controlled using pre-set timers to turn on and off fertilizer injectors and irrigation pumps, and also to set the frequency and duration of supply. Therefore, fertigation management is usually based only on predictive algorithms or historical data, which may not be accurate for all situations. Development of a microcontroller-based fertigation management system within the Nigerian (Sub-Saharan Africa) region using a capacitive soil moisture sensor and a JXCT-IOT Frequency Domain Reflectometry (FDR) soil nitrogen sensor is presented. The sensors are placed in the soil around the root region of plants to enable a microcontroller to monitor the soil properties, determine how much water or nutrients the plant needs, and supply the amount needed through a drip irrigation framework. The tap water and urea solution are placed inside separate reservoirs and supplied to the plant through solenoid valves controlled by the microcontroller. Furthermore, an Internet of Things (IoT) client (Blynk IoT) was integrated with the fertigation system so that the fertigation process, as well as the soil state, could be monitored and controlled remotely. The data read from the sensors as well as the state of the solenoid valves were sent over the internet to be stored on the Blynk servers. A website and mobile (Android) dashboards were also created using the Blynk IOT platform to display the states of the valves and the sensor readings. The automatic fertigation system was found to be functional. The system keeps the soil moisture and nitrogen content between the recommended ranges: moisture content between 25% and 46% and nitrogen content between 20 mg/kg and 30 mg/kg for cucumber crops. Fertigation events occur every morning between 5 and 6 am.

Development of Low-cost Soil Moisture Monitoring System for Efficient Irrigation Water Management of Upland Crops

With the advancement of information and communication technology, various types of soil moisture sensors have been developed. Coupled with data loggers, these sensors could prove useful in monitoring soil moisture in upland crop production areas which in turn could be used for efficient irrigation water management. However, most of these sensors are costly and unaffordable to most farmers in developing countries. Hence, a low-cost soil moisture monitoring system intended to facilitate irrigation water management in upland crop production systems was developed in this study. The device was built with a capacitive soil moisture sensor, an ESP8266 Wi-Fi mini board, and a datalogging shield with RTC. Soil moisture measurements are transmitted via ESP-NOW to a server which also uses an ESP8266 Wi-Fi mini board. The low-cost soil moisture monitoring system was evaluated based on its measurement of volumetric water content and transmission of data via ESP-NOW. The performance of the capacitive soil moisture sensor was compared with the ICT International MP306 soil moisture sensor. Statistical analyses showed that volumetric water contents measured by the capacitive soil moisture sensor are comparable to those of the MP306 soil moisture sensor, thus conceived as a low-cost alternative to the high-end sensor. Moreover, test results on the range of ESP-NOW showed that data can be successfully transmitted over long distances. With regards to this, the low-cost soil moisture monitoring system may be integrated with other technologies to enable irrigation scheduling and automation for efficient irrigation water management in upland crop production systems.

IoT BASED SOIL MOISTURE MANAGEMENT USING CAPACITIVE SENSOR AND USER-FRIENDLY SMARTPHONE APPLICATION

The Internet of Things (IoT) based system was assembled to monitor the moisture of soils for both indoor and outdoor uses. The SKU:SEN0193 capacitive soil moisture sensor exhibited a linear response to a variation in water volume added to the soil. Microcontroller Arduino NodeMCU was used with ESP8266 Wi-Fi module to transfer the sensing data in real-time, and the soil moisture data was displayed by the Blynk application on a smartphone. When the moisture dropped under the pre-defined threshold, the user was informed via the Line application and able to remotely trigger the irrigation pump

SMART GARDEN SEBAGAI IMPLEMENTASI SISTEM KONTROL DAN MONITORING TANAMAN BERBASIS TEKNOLOGI CERDAS

Smart garden is a control system application to monitor watering/plant care that utilizesintelligent technology. This study reviews the components used in smart gardens and theapplication of smart gardens in community life. The components commonly used in smartgarden such as BLYNK App, Antares, wireless sensor and actuators networks, SMS Gateway,capacitive soil moisture sensor, temperature sensor, light sensor, Arduino nano, Arduino unoR3, Arduino mega 2560, and Raspberry Pi. Smart garden has been applied in agriculture andfarm with the aim of monitoring plant growth, optimizing harvest activities, developingecotourism and Adiwiyata program.

Single Probe Imitation of Multi-Depth Capacitive Soil Moisture Sensor Using Bidirectional Recurrent Neural Network

This work proposes a single probe imitation of multidepth capacitive soil moisture sensor for low-cost and energy-efficient implementation of IoT-assisted wireless sensor network (IoWSN) farm monitoring infrastructure. A conditioning circuit (CC) is devised to capture the behavior of soil water movement and its impact on soil moisture around the probe at different depths. The captured correlation is used to train the proposed neural network (NN) models to estimate the soil water content (SWC) at different soil depths based on a single measurement taken at the reference depth. To adjust the weight of the neurons, training and test dataset are collected through a measurement campaign. The data are collected during the cropping period of paddy vegetation by deploying 150 sensor nodes at different depths in bare land before sowing. Two NN models—artificial neural network (ANN) and bidirectional long short term memory network (BLSTM)—are proposed and compared based on the accuracy of SWC estimation. To demonstrate the efficacy of the concept, the proposed sensor design is compared with relevant soil moisture sensors reported over the past five years. The root mean square error (RMSE), <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${R^{2}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> and mean absolute percentage error (MAPE)-based analysis validate the significance of the proposed NN models.

Monitoring rainfall intensity and moisture water content using soil column experiment

Indonesia is a tropical country that has two seasons, rainy season and dry season. The wetting and drying of soil due to changing of the seasons caused change on soil properties such as moisture soil water content, effective soil porosity, soil suction etc. During rainy season, rainfall infiltration caused increasing of moisture soil water content in a soil slope, tends to reduce soil shear strength and followed by slope instability. In this soil column experiment was set up with rain gauge station and YL-69 sensor and capacitive soil moisture sensor to monitor rainfall infiltration and soil moisture water content in red clay soil. A wireless sensor network with low power wide area network technology integrated with the cloud to observe rainfall intensity and soil water content in soil column with realtime monitoring. The focused on improving the accuracy of rainfall intensity and soil water content sensors readings using regression methods. The experiment results showed that rainfall intensity was observed accurately while for the YL-69 sensor, the error reading was 5.15% and the error reading capacitive soil moisture sensor was 2.99%.

Construction of 3D Soil Moisture Maps in Agricultural Fields by Using Wireless Sensor Communication

Over-irrigation without considering the soil property reduce the product yield and variety in many agricultural areas. In this study, it is aimed to produce a more useful, and user-friendly 3D soil moisture detection system by using wireless communication across the agricultural areas. The deficiencies of agricultural land can be eliminated in terms of irrigation, product variety, and product yield. 3D moisture information obtained from the soil can be transferred to a database system and the farmers can use this system to cultivate across the correct fields. A capacitive soil moisture sensor is deployed as a sensor unit. Each sensor unit with its electronics is placed in a PVC pipe with a specific length. This PVC pipe is placed vertically in the soil with sensor electrodes contacting the soil. Moisture measurements are carried out across the agricultural area. The system provides 3D moisture maps of the soil at fixed depths. Each 3D map represents a sub-surface moisture layer. The sensor units are calibrated by measuring the moisture in the water, corresponding to %100 moisture in the soil, and the moisture in dry air, corresponding to %0 moisture in the soil. A percentage moisture determination formula is developed between these two extreme levels for each sensor unit. Hence the benefit of the results will be the knowledge of % moisture values in-depth profile of the agricultural areas. Farmers will have comprehensive and real-time information about moisture data and this data will help them to grow better crops.

Water absorption analysis of a peat‐perlite horticultural substrate in response to various subirrigation conditions using a thermal imaging camera

Subirrigation systems are widely used in commercial greenhouses for efficient and high-quality production of potted plants. However, proper criteria of the water level and retention time need to be quantified for more efficient irrigation. This study analyzed the water absorption and vertical water distribution in a horticultural substrate in 10-cm pots under various subirrigation water levels and retention times. To analyze the water absorption dynamics, we continuously measured changes in the actual substrate volumetric water content using capacitance soil moisture sensors. The vertical distribution of water in the pot was measured using a thermal imaging camera, with a small temperature difference indicating more water absorption. As expected, the volumetric water content in the pots increased as the subirrigation water level and retention time increased; however, significantly less water was absorbed near the top surface of the substrate, and the variation of the vertical water distribution increased at lower subirrigation water levels or shorter retention times. This suggests that young plants with smaller root systems would require a higher water level and retention time for subirrigation if their roots are distributed near the top of the pot. This study provides a better understanding of water absorption and its vertical distribution across a horticultural substrate when using a subirrigation system and supports decision making for the suitable management of subirrigation conditions according to the type of plant species or crop growth stage.