Location: Soil Dynamics Research
Project Number: 6010-21600-002-007-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Aug 15, 2024
End Date: Aug 15, 2028
Objective:
To create a cost-effective and scalable unmanned aerial vehicles based monitoring solution that is fully autonomous and supports sustainable farming.
Approach:
This project will develop a decentralized, autonomous flock of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to monitor large agricultural fields for crops and weeds. The proposed drone swarm will consist of small, low-cost drones equipped with specialized cameras for collaboratively gathering data on crop health and identifying the presence of weeds. Based on the collected data, the system will enable at least one large spraying drone to reach the identified spot with optimized path planning, thereby closing the feedback loop. This system will provide farmers with real-time insights, enabling precise and timely interventions to enhance crop yield and reduce reliance on manual monitoring of large agricultural fields.
