Precision AgriculturePrecision AgricultureSmart Farm StationsSmart Farm Stations

Yunxin Li and Raymond WangMotorola Australian Research Centre

Changing Farm EnvironmentChanging Farm Environment Merging and ConsolidatiionMerging and Consolidatiion

– Run by corporations instead of familiesRun by corporations instead of families

– Larger areas per farmLarger areas per farm

Increasing Global CompetitionIncreasing Global Competition

– Proifits from crop quality as well as quantityProifits from crop quality as well as quantity

– Costs and productivity improvementCosts and productivity improvement

• More sophysticated machinery and More sophysticated machinery and equipment per farmerequipment per farmer

– Sustainable growthSustainable growth

Increasing Environmental ConcernsIncreasing Environmental Concerns

– Land and environment conservationLand and environment conservation

– Polution reductionPolution reduction

– Natural disaster damage controlNatural disaster damage control

Evolving Farming TechnologyEvolving Farming TechnologyTodayToday

Electrical and mechanicalElectrical and mechanical

Hardware orientedHardware oriented

Manual and on-site controlManual and on-site control

Independent dumb machinesIndependent dumb machines

User and environment demandingUser and environment demanding

Unpredictable quality and quantity Unpredictable quality and quantity

TomorrowTomorrow

InformationInformation

Software orientedSoftware oriented

Automatic and remote controlAutomatic and remote control

Networked smart machinesNetworked smart machines

User and environment friendlyUser and environment friendly

Predictable in quality and quantityPredictable in quality and quantity

Precision Agriculture is an environment friendly system solution that optimizes product quality and quantity while minimising cost, human intervention and the variation caused by unpredictable nature.

Precision Agriculture SolutionsPrecision Agriculture Solutions

•Manual

•Unreliable

•Wired, Bulky

•User demanding

•Wireless integrated

•Zero configuration

•Location awareness

System ArchitectureSystem Architecture

FarmerFarmhouse

Base Station

10-25 acre

Zones

•Multi-hop

•10-100m per hop

•smart antennas

Smart Farm Station

System RequirementsSystem Requirements Low-cost, low-power, small size networking devicesLow-cost, low-power, small size networking devices

– unliscenced bandunliscenced band

– short distance per hopshort distance per hop

– low date ratelow date rate

• Sensor information data < 50 bps/zoneSensor information data < 50 bps/zone

– low mobilitylow mobility

Long Battery life (> 8 months)Long Battery life (> 8 months)

Robust to environment variationRobust to environment variation

– temperature, humidity, rain, wind, growing plantstemperature, humidity, rain, wind, growing plants

User friendlyUser friendly

– Minimal network set-up and configurationMinimal network set-up and configuration

– Minimal network managementMinimal network management

System RequirementsSystem RequirementsCharacteristic Value or RangeData rate (effective, not raw) Scalable from 600 bps to 64

kbpsRange (free space) 50 metersBattery life (with normal product usage) 8 monthsLatency (time between data ready for sending inappl. to data received by other appl.)

1 second

Nodes per network Effectively unlimitedTopology (master-slave/peer-to-peer, routing,repeaters)

Peer-to-peer and multi-hoprouting

Types of traffic (small/big packets,steady/bursty, asynch/isoc)

Short packet, bursty andasynchronous

Security (yes/no/optional) optionalRF output power (units such as dBm, subjectivesuch as controllable)

<1 dBm, with automatic powercontrol

Duty Cycle (what percentage of time the devicehas its RX/TX active)

1/1024 ~ 1/16

Temperature (industrial or indoor) -40C ~ +85C

Worry-free TomorrowWorry-free Tomorrow