Remote Sensing: Useful Approach for Crop Nitrogen Management and Sustainable Agriculture

Soil fertility is among the most important criteria that affect crop yield and quality. Nitrogen stress due to the low soil fertility and the lack of nitrogen availability is a major factor limiting the crop productivity in arid and semiarid environments, where fertilization is not optimized in terms of timing and quantity. Managing nitrogen fertilization is one of the most important criteria in the precision agriculture, which helps to improve crop production, environment conditions, and farmer’s economy. It is very important to apply N fertilizers with efficient methods allowing to the nutrient use efficiency and avoiding nitrogen losses and environment contamination. Nowadays, remote sensing methods using spectral and thermal approaches have been proposed as potential indicators to rapid identification of crop nitrogen status by providing information about vegetation canopy properties across large areas. The use of remote sensing methods to schedule nitrogen fertilization can help farmers to practice a more sustainable agriculture, minimizing risks of losing the harvest by providing an adequate rate of nitrogen when the crops’ needs and at a specific location

Scatternet Formation Protocol for Environmental Monitoring in a Smart Garden

[EN] The monitoring of different parameters in the smart garden environment requires thousands of nodes and actuators. They form a multi-hop communication network. The scatternets formed with Bluetooth protocol is a communication solution. However, there is no current algorithm that considers the different capabilities of the devices (sensors or actuators) and assigns a role according to these capabilities. In this paper, we present a network topology formation algorithm for role assignment and connection establishment which considers the capabilities of the devices and use slave-slave Bridge to communicate the piconets. We design the algorithms needed for this protocol and test it. We have simulated the algorithms in order to evaluate the time needed for role assignment and to establish the first connections of the piconet. The results include different scenarios composed by one or two masters and one to seven slaves. In addition, we evaluate the established connections in piconets and bridges in a real case of the smart garden sensor network. Finally, we present the changes in the piconet connections after the deployment of two nodes in an existing network.This work is partially found by the European Union with the “Fondo Europeo Agrícola de Desarrollo Rural (FEADER) – Europa invierte en zonas rurales”, the MAPAMA, and Comunidad de Madrid with the IMIDRA, under the mark of the PDR-CM 2014-2020” project number PDR18-XEROCESPED. This work has been partially supported by the "Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad" in the "Programa Estatal de Fomento de la Investigación Científica y Técnica de Excelencia, Subprograma Estatal de Generación de Conocimiento" within the project under Grant TIN2017-84802-C2-1-P. This work has also been partially supported by European Union through the ERANETMED (Euromediterranean Cooperation through ERANET joint activities and beyond) project ERANETMED3-227 SMARTWATIR.Parra-Boronat, L.; Marín, J.; Mauri Ablanque, PV.; Lloret, J.; Torices, V.; Massager, A. (2018). Scatternet Formation Protocol for Environmental Monitoring in a Smart Garden. Network Protocols and Algorithms. 10(3):63-84. https://doi.org/10.5296/npa.v10i3.14122S638410

Seed and Straw Characterization of Nine New Varieties of <i>Camelina sativa</i> (L.) Crantz

Camelina sativa (L.) Crantz is a promising oilseed crop that has increased worldwide attention because of its agronomic characteristics and potential uses. From an agricultural point of view, this plant can grow in different environments, providing a good yield with low input requirements. In addition, camelina seeds contain a high percentage of oil (36–47%) and protein (24–31%), making them interesting for food or energy industries. Nevertheless, its cultivation is not widespread in Europe, particularly in Spain. In the present context of global change and the search for new sustainable crops, we are conducting two pilot projects aiming to confirm that camelina is a good option for oilseed crops in semi-arid climates (especially in central Spain, Madrid) and to find new profitable varieties for farmers. To reach our objective we have used nine new varieties, recently developed, to characterize and compare their seed oil content, and their seed and straw chemical composition. Finally, with our preliminary results, we determine which varieties present better properties to be used in future agricultural research or breeding programs. These results are part of a larger study that we are carrying out