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Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings

Global climate change and exponential population growth pose a challenge to agricultural outputs. In this scenario, novel techniques have been proposed to improve plant growth and increase crop yields. Wearable sensors are emerging as promising tools for the non-invasive monitoring of plant physiolo...

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Autores principales: Lo Presti, Daniela, Di Tocco, Joshua, Cimini, Sara, Cinti, Stefano, Massaroni, Carlo, D’Amato, Rosaria, Caponero, Michele A., De Gara, Laura, Schena, Emiliano
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9824679/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36616959
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s23010361
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author Lo Presti, Daniela
Di Tocco, Joshua
Cimini, Sara
Cinti, Stefano
Massaroni, Carlo
D’Amato, Rosaria
Caponero, Michele A.
De Gara, Laura
Schena, Emiliano
author_facet Lo Presti, Daniela
Di Tocco, Joshua
Cimini, Sara
Cinti, Stefano
Massaroni, Carlo
D’Amato, Rosaria
Caponero, Michele A.
De Gara, Laura
Schena, Emiliano
author_sort Lo Presti, Daniela
collection PubMed
description Global climate change and exponential population growth pose a challenge to agricultural outputs. In this scenario, novel techniques have been proposed to improve plant growth and increase crop yields. Wearable sensors are emerging as promising tools for the non-invasive monitoring of plant physiological and microclimate parameters. Features of plant wearables, such as easy anchorage to different organs, compliance with natural surfaces, high flexibility, and biocompatibility, allow for the detection of growth without impacting the plant functions. This work proposed two wearable sensors based on fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) within silicone matrices. The use of FBGs is motivated by their high sensitivity, multiplexing capacities, and chemical inertia. Firstly, we focused on the design and the fabrication of two plant wearables with different matrix shapes tailored to specific plant organs (i.e., tobacco stem and melon fruit). Then, we described the sensors’ metrological properties to investigate the sensitivity to strain and the influence of environmental factors, such as temperature and humidity, on the sensors’ performance. Finally, we performed experimental tests to preliminary assess the capability of the proposed sensors to monitor dimensional changes of plants in both laboratory and open field settings. The promising results will foster key actions to improve the use of this innovative technology in smart agriculture applications for increasing crop products quality, agricultural efficiency, and profits.
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spelling pubmed-98246792023-01-08 Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings Lo Presti, Daniela Di Tocco, Joshua Cimini, Sara Cinti, Stefano Massaroni, Carlo D’Amato, Rosaria Caponero, Michele A. De Gara, Laura Schena, Emiliano Sensors (Basel) Article Global climate change and exponential population growth pose a challenge to agricultural outputs. In this scenario, novel techniques have been proposed to improve plant growth and increase crop yields. Wearable sensors are emerging as promising tools for the non-invasive monitoring of plant physiological and microclimate parameters. Features of plant wearables, such as easy anchorage to different organs, compliance with natural surfaces, high flexibility, and biocompatibility, allow for the detection of growth without impacting the plant functions. This work proposed two wearable sensors based on fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) within silicone matrices. The use of FBGs is motivated by their high sensitivity, multiplexing capacities, and chemical inertia. Firstly, we focused on the design and the fabrication of two plant wearables with different matrix shapes tailored to specific plant organs (i.e., tobacco stem and melon fruit). Then, we described the sensors’ metrological properties to investigate the sensitivity to strain and the influence of environmental factors, such as temperature and humidity, on the sensors’ performance. Finally, we performed experimental tests to preliminary assess the capability of the proposed sensors to monitor dimensional changes of plants in both laboratory and open field settings. The promising results will foster key actions to improve the use of this innovative technology in smart agriculture applications for increasing crop products quality, agricultural efficiency, and profits. MDPI 2022-12-29 /pmc/articles/PMC9824679/ /pubmed/36616959 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s23010361 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Lo Presti, Daniela
Di Tocco, Joshua
Cimini, Sara
Cinti, Stefano
Massaroni, Carlo
D’Amato, Rosaria
Caponero, Michele A.
De Gara, Laura
Schena, Emiliano
Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title_full Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title_fullStr Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title_full_unstemmed Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title_short Plant Growth Monitoring: Design, Fabrication, and Feasibility Assessment of Wearable Sensors Based on Fiber Bragg Gratings
title_sort plant growth monitoring: design, fabrication, and feasibility assessment of wearable sensors based on fiber bragg gratings
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9824679/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36616959
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s23010361
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