Are Sensors Key to Achieving Regenerative Agriculture?
With the agricultural sector facing mounting pressure to reduce their carbon footprint, greater emphasis has been placed on improving existing components and practices, such as soil health and biodiversity, which have since emerged as key components to achieving regenerative agriculture.
Sensors provide the opportunity to measure crop and soil health at unparalleled scales and resolution. Key developments in sensor technology will help improve our current understanding and optimisation of the complex agricultural systems that make up our global ecosystem.
Advances in sensor technology for sustainable crop production provides a comprehensive review of the wealth of research on key developments in sensor technology to improve monitoring and management of crop health, soil health, weeds and diseases. This collection also reviews advances in proximal and remote sensing techniques to monitor soil health, such as spectroscopy and radiometrics, as well as how sensor technology can be optimised for more targeted irrigation, site-specific nutrient and weed management.
Key Features:
- Assesses key developments in sensor technology to improve monitoring and management of complex agricultural systems
- Considers the growing influence of proximal crop sensors in assessing, monitoring and measuring the health of agricultural soils
- Explores the potential of remote and aerial sensing towards achieving sustainable crop production through more targeted irrigation management, site-specific nutrient management and weed management
Audience: Researchers in crop, soil, environment and computer science, farmers, growers, agricultural professionals offering specialist advice and services as well as government and other private sector agencies monitoring the health of agricultural soils and supporting sustainable crop production.
Table of Contents
Executive Summary
Remote sensing and satellite imagery are deployed in a variety of commercial, governmental and consumer settings.
Most notably, sensors and satellites are utilised by military personnel to gather on-the-ground-intelligence, whereas meteorologists use similar technologies to create weather forecasts and monitor extreme weather events.
As the agricultural sector continues to face increasing pressure to reduce its carbon footprint and consequent contribution to climate change, key stakeholders are now investing in sensor technology to optimise agricultural production and reduce its environmental impact.
The book considers the emergence of sensor technology and its use to measure crop and soil health at unparalleled scales and resolution.
“The versatility of sensor technology and its application to an array of industries is truly remarkable,” says Francis Dodds, Editorial Director at Burleigh Dodds Science Publishing.
“In this new book, we’ve brought together some of the world’s best researchers in the field of sensor technology to illustrate how the agricultural sector utilises these technologies to optimise both crop and livestock production,” he adds.
Advances in sensor technology for sustainable crop production is the latest addition to the publisher’s extensive Agricultural Science Series and provides a comprehensive review of the wealth of research on the key developments in sensor technology to improve the monitoring and management of crop and soil health, as well as agricultural weeds and diseases.
“Much of future innovation in crop production will revolve around digital agriculture - the collection, management, interpretation and application of data. Sensor technology is a key component of this future,” says Dr Richard B. Ferguson, Professor and International Soil Scientist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA.
“Thus it is exciting to see this collection about the application of sensors in sustainable crop production from these highly knowledgeable authors. This will be an important reference for students, researchers and practitioners applying sensors in crop production systems,” he concludes.
The book reviews recent advances in proximal and remote sensing techniques to monitor soil health, such as spectroscopy and radiometrics, as well as how sensor technology can be optimised to achieve more targeted irrigation and site-specific nutrient and weed management.
“It’s great to see our Agricultural Science series expanding into important new areas,” says Rob Burleigh, Managing Director at Burleigh Dodds Science Publishing.
With over 4000 international experts contributing over 1900 research reviews, the content database provides a trusted and authoritative resource to empower those working in business, industry and academia to make agriculture more sustainable.
About the Editors
Dr Alain Tabbgh received his PhD degree from ‘Université Pierre et Marie Curie’ in Paris in 1971 and his ‘thèse d’état’ in 1977 for his research work in geophysical prospecting for archaeology. Since 1972 he is teacher-researcher in this university where he was elected professor of applied geophysics in 1988. He has been director of the ‘Centre de Recherches Géophysiques de Garchy’ of the CNRS and director of the UMR7619 ‘Sisyphe’ (UPMC/CNRS/EPHE/ENSMP).Barry Allred is a Research Agricultural Engineer with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) - Agricultural Research Service (ARS) - Soil Drainage Research Unit in Columbus, Ohio. He developed the concept and served as principal editor for the first book devoted to the topic of applying near-surface geophysical methods to agriculture (Handbook of Agricultural Geophysics - CRC Press). He has been active in the Environmental and Engineering Geophysical Society; serving as President, Vice-President Committees, Editor-in-Chief of the FastTIMES news magazine, a virtual symposium lead coordinator, organizing two of the society’s conference workshops, and chairing several SAGEEP technical sessions.
Professor Jeffrey Walker received his B.E. (Civil) and B.Surveying degrees in 1995 with Hons 1 and University Medal from the University of Newcastle, Australia, and his Ph.D. in Water Resources Engineering from the same University in 1999. His Ph.D. thesis was among the early pioneering research on estimation of root-zone soil moisture from assimilation of remotely sensed surface soil moisture observations. He then joined NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre to implement his soil moisture work globally. In 2001 he moved to the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Melbourne as Lecturer, where he continued his soil moisture work, including development of the only Australian airborne capability for simulating new satellite missions for soil moisture. In 2010 he was appointed as Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at Monash University where he is continuing this research. He is contributing to soil moisture satellite missions at NASA, ESA and JAXA, as a Science Team member for the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission and Cal/val Team member for the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) and Global Change Observation Mission – Water (GCOM-W) respectively.
Dr Asim Biswas is a Professor in the School of Environmental Sciences at the University of Guelph, Canada. He is a member of the Royal Society of Canada College, the President of Canadian Society of Soil Science, Vice-Chair of the IUSS WG-PSS and is an Associate Editor of eight journals. He is internationally known for his research on data-driven sustainable soil management.
Dr Craig Lobsey is a Senior Lecturer in Mechatronic Engineering at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. He is Chair of the International Union of Soil Sciences (IUSS) Working Group on Proximal Soil Sensing (WG-PSS). His research extends across many different sensor technologies and applications, with a focus on improving our understanding and optimisation of agricultural systems. He has previously guest edited a special issue of Sensors on ‘Proximal Soil Sensing’.
