Data fusion technology for precision forestry applications

Presently precision forestry is playing an important role in realizing sustainable development and improving societal and economical efficiency for forestry applications. Based on analyzing the features of precision forestry's information requirements, the data needed for precision forestry were classified and the characteristics of the different information were summarized. Data fusion for precision forestry was studied in this paper. The architecture for precision forestry information processing, which integrated information fusion and data mining, was put forward. New and emerging technologies such as Remote Sensing (RS), Geographical Information System (GIS), Global Position System (GPS), Data Base Management System (DBMS), Data Fusion, Decision Support Systems (DSS), and Variable Rate technology (VRT) are applied in forestry production as aids in producers' and managers' decision-making process. Precision irrigation, precision fertilizing, precision pesticide application, precision harvesting, and precision deforestation can promote the realization of minimizing resource inputs, minimizing environmental impacts, and maximizing forest outputs

Fleets of robots for environmentally-safe pest control in agriculture

Feeding the growing global population requires an annual increase in food production. This requirement suggests an increase in the use of pesticides, which represents an unsustainable chemical load for the environment. To reduce pesticide input and preserve the environment while maintaining the necessary level of food production, the efficiency of relevant processes must be drastically improved. Within this context, this research strived to design, develop, test and assess a new generation of automatic and robotic systems for effective weed and pest control aimed at diminishing the use of agricultural chemical inputs, increasing crop quality and improving the health and safety of production operators. To achieve this overall objective, a fleet of heterogeneous ground and aerial robots was developed and equipped with innovative sensors, enhanced end-effectors and improved decision control algorithms to cover a large variety of agricultural situations. This article describes the scientific and technical objectives, challenges and outcomes achieved in three common crops

Sensors in agriculture and forestry

Agriculture and Forestry are two broad and promising areas demanding technological solutions with the aim of increasing production or accurate inventories for sustainability while the environmental impact is minimized by reducing the application of agro-chemicals and increasing the use of environmental friendly agronomical practices. In addition, the immediate consequence of this “trend” is the reduction of production costs. Sensors-based technologies provide appropriate tools to achieve the above mentioned goals. The explosive technological advances and development in recent years enormously facilitates the attainment of these objectives removing many barriers for their implementation, including the reservations expressed by the farmers themselves. Precision Agriculture is an emerging area where sensor-based technologies play an important role.RHEA project [42], which is funded by the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under Grant Agreement NO.245986, which has been the platform for the two international conferences on Robotics and associated High-technologies and Equipment mentioned above.Peer Reviewe

Engineering for a changing world: 60th Ilmenau Scientific Colloquium, Technische Universität Ilmenau, September 04-08, 2023 : programme

In 2023, the Ilmenau Scientific Colloquium is once more organised by the Department of Mechanical Engineering. The title of this year’s conference “Engineering for a Changing World” refers to limited natural resources of our planet, to massive changes in cooperation between continents, countries, institutions and people – enabled by the increased implementation of information technology as the probably most dominant driver in many fields. The Colloquium, supplemented by workshops, is characterised but not limited to the following topics: – Precision engineering and measurement technology Nanofabrication – Industry 4.0 and digitalisation in mechanical engineering – Mechatronics, biomechatronics and mechanism technology – Systems engineering – Productive teaming - Human-machine collaboration in the production environment The topics are oriented on key strategic aspects of research and teaching in Mechanical Engineering at our university

Vision and advocacy of optoelectronic technology developments in the AECO sector

Purpose This research presents a literature review of laser scanning and 3D modelling devices, modes of delivery and applications within the architecture, engineering, construction and owner-operated (AECO) sector. Such devices are inextricably linked to modern digital built environment practices, particularly when used in conjunction with as-built building information modelling (BIM) development. The research also reports upon innovative technological advancements (such as machine vision) that coalesce with 3D scanning solutions. Design/methodology/approach A synthesis of literature is used to develop: a hierarchy of the modes of delivery for laser scan devices; a thematic analysis of 3D terrestrial laser scan technology applications; and a componential cross-comparative tabulation of laser scan technology and specifications. Findings Findings reveal that the costly and labour intensive attributes of laser scanning devices have stimulated the development of hybrid automated and intelligent technologies to improve performance. Such developments are set to satisfy the increasing demand for digitisation of both existing and new buildings into BIM. Future work proposed will seek to: review what coalescence of digital technologies will provide an optimal and cost effective solution to accurately reconstructing the digital built environment; conduct case studies that implement hybrid digital solutions in pragmatic facilities management scenarios to measure their performance and user satisfaction; and eliminate manual remodelling tasks (such as point cloud reconstruction) via the use of computational intelligence algorithms integral within cloud based BIM platforms. Originality/value Although laser scanning and 3D modelling have been widely covered en passant within the literature, scant research has conducted an holistic review of the technology, its applications and future developments. This review presents concise and lucid reference guidance that will intellectually challenge, and better inform, both practitioners and researchers

Constructing living buildings: a review of relevant technologies for a novel application of biohybrid robotics

Biohybrid robotics takes an engineering approach to the expansion and exploitation of biological behaviours for application to automated tasks. Here, we identify the construction of living buildings and infrastructure as a high-potential application domain for biohybrid robotics, and review technological advances relevant to its future development. Construction, civil infrastructure maintenance and building occupancy in the last decades have comprised a major portion of economic production, energy consumption and carbon emissions. Integrating biological organisms into automated construction tasks and permanent building components therefore has high potential for impact. Live materials can provide several advantages over standard synthetic construction materials, including self-repair of damage, increase rather than degradation of structural performance over time, resilience to corrosive environments, support of biodiversity, and mitigation of urban heat islands. Here, we review relevant technologies, which are currently disparate. They span robotics, self-organizing systems, artificial life, construction automation, structural engineering, architecture, bioengineering, biomaterials, and molecular and cellular biology. In these disciplines, developments relevant to biohybrid construction and living buildings are in the early stages, and typically are not exchanged between disciplines. We, therefore, consider this review useful to the future development of biohybrid engineering for this highly interdisciplinary application.publishe

Estimating the Position of the Harvester Head – a Key Step towards the Precision Forestry of the Future?

Modern harvesters are technologically sophisticated, with many useful features such as the ability to automatically measure stem diameters and lengths. This information is processed in real time to support value optimization when cutting stems into logs. It can also be transferred from the harvesters to centralized systems and used for wood supply management. Such information management systems have been available since the 1990s in Sweden and Finland, and are constantly being upgraded. However, data on the position of the harvester head relative to the machine are generally not recorded during harvesting. The routine acquisition and analysis of such data could offer several opportunities to improve forestry operations and related processes in the future. Here, we analyze the possible benefits of having this information, as well as the steps required to collect and process it. The benefits and drawbacks of different sensing technologies are discussed in terms of potential applications, accuracy and cost. We also present the results of preliminary testing using two of the proposed methods. Our analysis indicates that an improved scope for mapping and controlling machine movement is the main benefit that is directly related to the conduct of forestry operations. In addition, there are important indirect benefits relating to ecological mapping. Our analysis suggests that both of these benefits can be realized by measuring the angles of crane joints or the locations of crane segments and using the resulting information to compute the head\u27s position. In keeping with our findings, two companies have recently introduced sensor equipped crane solutions

Topology Recoverability Prediction for Ad-Hoc Robot Networks: A Data-Driven Fault-Tolerant Approach

Faults occurring in ad-hoc robot networks may fatally perturb their topologies leading to disconnection of subsets of those networks. Optimal topology synthesis is generally resource-intensive and time-consuming to be done in real time for large ad-hoc robot networks. One should only perform topology re-computations if the probability of topology recoverability after the occurrence of any fault surpasses that of its irrecoverability. We formulate this problem as a binary classification problem. Then, we develop a two-pathway data-driven model based on Bayesian Gaussian mixture models that predicts the solution to a typical problem by two different pre-fault and post-fault prediction pathways. The results, obtained by the integration of the predictions of those pathways, clearly indicate the success of our model in solving the topology (ir)recoverability prediction problem compared to the best of current strategies found in the literature