Effects of conservation and standard tillage on soil physico-chemical properties and overall quality in a semi-arid agrosystem

Shifting agricultural operations to more sustainable management practices is needed in the face of a changing climate. In this study, the short-term effects of three tillage systems (no-tillage, minimum tillage, and conventional tillage) on a wide selection of soil properties in a semi-arid agrosystem of eastern Tunisia were assessed. The studied soil properties included saturation percentage, bulk density, penetration resistance, mean weight diameter, electric conductivity, soil reaction, soil organic matter, carbonates, available phosphorus and exchangeable potassium. The impacts of tillage systems on soil quality indices (SQI) developed based on the total set of properties (SQI-T), or a minimum set (SQI-M) selected through principal component analysis, were also investigated. Relative to conventional tillage, no tillage increased bulk density, penetration resistance and electrical conductivity, whereas minimum tillage affected only saturation percentage and pH. No-till and minimum tillage did not enhance soil quality relative to conventional tillage. The SQI-T and SQI-M were highly correlated (r=0.93) to each other suggesting that the outcomes of the two indices are comparable. Principal component analysis efficiently selected the most influential indicators of the effects of tillage systems on soil quality. Farmers in the study region are encouraged to consider minimum tillage during the early years of transition from standard to no-tillage systems to avoid rapid decline in soil quality and consequent yield loss

Nonlinear interpolators for old movie restoration

A nonlinear interpolator using a rational function filter is applied to the restoration of image sequence frames of digitized old movies. Samples to be interpolated are due to stationary and random defects. The interpolator is preceded by a defect localization algorithm. The performance of the proposed interpolator has been assessed on several sequences and compared with a classical morphological operator. The hardware implementation of the proposed rational interpolator is also considered. Simulations show that the interpolated frames with the proposed operator are free from blockiness and jaggedness which are very difficult to avoid when using linear operators

Versatile Internet of Things for Agriculture: An eXplainable AI Approach

Part 4: Fuzzy Algebra/SystemsInternational audienceThe increase of the adoption of IoT devices and the contemporary problem of food production have given rise to numerous applications of IoT in agriculture. These applications typically comprise a set of sensors that are installed in open fields and measure metrics, such as temperature or humidity, which are used for irrigation control systems. Though useful, most contemporary systems have high installation and maintenance costs, and they do not offer automated control or, if they do, they are usually not interpretable, and thus cannot be trusted for such critical applications. In this work, we design Vital, a system that incorporates a set of low-cost sensors, a robust data store, and most importantly an explainable AI decision support system. Our system outputs a fuzzy rule-base, which is interpretable and allows fully automating the irrigation of the fields. Upon evaluating Vital in two pilot cases, we conclude that it can be effective for monitoring open-field installations

DCT-Based Color Image Denoising: Efficiency Analysis and Prediction

International audienc