News

Presentation at the FER Open Door Day

On Saturday, November 25, 2023, the Open Doors Day of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing (FER) took place and attracted numerous visitors. This event offered the public, especially high-school students, the opportunity to explore the study programmes available at FER and learn about the ongoing research projects. Numerous departments and laboratories showcased their work, including the Internet of Things Laboratory.

Assistants Ivan KraljKatarina MandarićIvan ČilićDora Kreković, and Mislav Has presented the recently completed IoT-field project, which encompasses a comprehensive IoT solution from sensors through an interoperable platform to a user application for monitoring crops and meteorological conditions in the field. Attention was also drawn to the urban garden set up in the FER courtyard and the quantity of the harvest.

Visitors were particularly interested in the involvement of students in projects, and it was emphasized that, over the course of more than 3.5 years of the IoT-field project, students were actively engaged, resulting in a significant number of group projects, as well as undergraduate and graduate theses.

In addition to IoT-field, we presented the AIoTwin project, highlighting our collaboration with technical universities in Vienna and Berlin, as well as the RISE research center in Sweden. A new concept, the Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT), was introduced and explained. AIoT brings artificial intelligence into our physical environment and removes the boundaries between the physical and digital worlds, opening up new possibilities for device intelligence and autonomy in the physical environment.

Furthermore, assistants shared their experiences and impressions from their undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral studies with the visitors, mostly high school seniors and eighth-grade elementary school students.

This Open Doors Day of FER has, traditionally, proven to be extremely informative, contributing to the promotion of studies and science.

More photos from the event are available below.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Final workshop "Continuous...

The research team of the IoT-field project held the final workshop "Continuous monitoring of fields and crops for precision agriculture" on Monday, November 6, 2023 at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Zagreb. The event brought together about fifty experts and researchers from the academic and business sectors with the aim of informing the public about the results of the project and encouraging discussion about the application of IoT technologies in agriculture.

The workshop introduced the audience to the developed complete IoT solution for precision agriculture that supports various communication technologies for networking devices in the field (LoRaWAN, Zigbee, NB-IoT), which consists of a special device for field and crop monitoring, an interoperable IoT platform with support for analytical services specific to agricultural production and mobile applications intended for farmers to monitor conditions in the field.

The full workshop report and all presentations and photos are available here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Lecture at international workshop...

Prof. Mario Kušek gave a lecture entitled "Introduction to IoT & Project IoT Field" at the international IoT workshop "Work IoT Out" organized by EESTEC LC Zagreb. The lecture was held on October 23, 2023 at FER.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

The research team of the IoT-field project invites all interested representatives from the ICT and agronomic sector to participate in the workshop "Continuous monitoring of fields and crops for precision agriculture" ("Kontinuirani nadzor polja i usjeva za preciznu poljoprivredu"), which will be held on Monday, November 6th, 2023, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, Zagreb, Unska 3 (Grey Hall).

Participation in the workshop is free for all participants, but due to the organization and the limited number of participants, registration is required. Registration for participation is possible HERE until the scheduled places are filled, i.e. no later than November 3, 2023. The workshop will be held in Croatian.

About the workshop: The use of ICT and networked devices in agriculture can significantly improve the efficiency of land use and increase the quantity and quality of yields while reducing the negative impacts of climate change on the yields of crops of strategic importance for the Republic of Croatia. The goal of the workshop is to familiarize interested representatives of companies from the ICT sector with the technical details of a newly developed complete IoT solution that includes a hardware sensor node and a software platform for continuous monitoring of fields and crops. The platform includes a sensor part for real-time collection of agrometeorological data, a part for reliable data transmission and storage, a part for data processing and analysis, and an application for interaction with the end user.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Lecture at round table "Digital...

As part of the round table "Digital Agriculture and Climate Resilience: Embracing 5G Solutions" at the Agriclimate conference held in Osijek, Domagoj Šimić, a member of the IoT-field project team, gave a lecture on September 20, 2023 entitled "The future of plant performance modeling including 5G, AI, and data integration". The authors of the summary and presentation are Domagoj Šimić and the head of the IoT-field project, prof. Ivana Podnar Žarko, PhD. The presentation presented the results of the project, guidelines for further activities and projections for the development of modeling and monitoring of plant properties using 5G technology and artificial intelligence.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Paper at 17th International...

At the 17th International Conference on Telecommunications (ConTEL) held in Graz, Austria in July 2023, Mislav Has presented the paper "Evaluating Secure Variants of the MQTT Protocol on Resource-Constraint Devices for Precision Agriculture". The authors of the paper are Mislav Has, prof. Ph.D. Mario Kušek and Prof. Ph.D. Ivana Podnar Žarko.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Workshop "Complete IoT solution...

The research team of the IoT-field project held a workshop "Complete IoT-solution for continuous monitoring of fields and crops" for interested representatives from the ICT sector on Tuesday, June 27, 2023 at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computing and Information Technologies Osijek.

The workshop informed and familiarized interested representatives of companies from the ICT sector with the technical details of the newly developed complete IoT solution, which includes a hardware sensor node and a software platform for continuous monitoring of fields and crops. The presented platform includes a sensor part for real-time collection of agrometeorological data, a part for reliable data transmission and storage, a part for data processing and analysis, and an application for interaction with the end user.

The full workshop report and more photos are available here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

The research team of the IoT-field project invites all interested representatives from the ICT sector to participate in the workshop "Complete IoT solution for continuous monitoring of fields and crops" ("Cjelovito IoT-rješenje za kontinuirani nadzor polja i usjeva"), which will be held on Tuesday, June 27, 2023, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computing and Information Technologies Osijek, Kneza Trpimira 2b. The workshop will be held in Croatian.

Participation in the workshop is free for all participants, but due to the organization and the limited number of participants, registration is required. Registration for participation is possible HERE until the scheduled places are filled, i.e. no later than June 25, 2023.

About the workshop: The use of ICT and networked devices in agriculture can significantly improve the efficiency of land use and increase the quantity and quality of yields while reducing the negative impacts of climate change on the yields of crops of strategic importance for the Republic of Croatia. The goal of the workshop is to familiarize interested representatives of companies from the ICT sector with the technical details of a newly developed complete IoT solution that includes a hardware sensor node and a software platform for continuous monitoring of fields and crops. The platform includes a sensor part for real-time collection of agrometeorological data, a part for reliable data transmission and storage, a part for data processing and analysis, and an application for interaction with the end user.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

The participants of the workshop “Precision agriculture and continuous data collection from the field” were presented with a software and hardware solution for monitoring the state of crops and environmental parameters in real time, which were developed during three years of project activities.

Using the developed mobile application, users can view data from different sources, i.e. sensor cells – as part of the project, a new sensor node was developed that, based on wavelengths, evaluates the functionality of plants in the field and shows whether the plant is under stress. Each sensor station may contain one or more meteorological parameters, such as soil temperature, soil moisture, air temperature, air humidity, radiation, pressure, wind speed, wind direction, rainfall, leaf moisture, etc. Each of these meteorological parameters parameters can be viewed graphically or tabularly. Users can filter cells by keywords and data by date range and by interval (1 day, 1 hour or 15 minutes).

Also, the user can view the current GDD (Growing Degree Days) which is used to estimate the growth and development of the crop during a season so that the harvest is done at the optimal time. GDD is calculated by subtracting the lower base/limit temperature of the crop (e.g. for corn it is 10°C) from the average daily air temperature. Currently, the application is adapted only for corn, but an upgrade is planned for other types of crops.

The mobile application was developed using the React Native programming language. React Native is developed on top of ReactJS, and Android and iOS applications can be developed simultaneously. The mobile application is connected to the sensor nodes via the IoT platform. The developed innovative system helps the farmer in monitoring critical periods in plant development and applying timely agrotechnical measures.

See what Ivan Kralj, the developer of the application, had to say about the application in Osijek Television’s report on the held workshop!

As part of the workshop, held on March 1 in Osijek, the research team of the IoT-field project educated agricultural producers, experts and the scientific public about the possibilities of applying information and communication technologies and networked devices in agriculture with the aim of increasing the efficiency of land use and reducing the negative impacts of climate change. changes in yields and quality of crops of strategic importance for Croatia.

All presentations from the workshop, including Ivanov’s on the mobile application, and additional information about the workshop, are available here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Significant visibility of the...

The researchers of the IoT-field project participated in the work of two meetings organized by the Faculty of Agriculture of the University of Zagreb in mid-February: the International Summit on Renewable Energy (INSORE2023) and the 58th Croatian and 18th International Symposium of Agronomists (SA2023).

Assoc. prof. Domagoj Šimić, Ph.D. held a plenary lecture at the INSORE2023 meeting entitled "Crop production, climate change and data galore: where are we now?".

Prof. Ivana Podnar Žarko, Ph.D. participated in the "Implementation of green innovations" panel where she spoke about the challenges of digitization in agriculture.

Vlatko Galić, Ph.D. held a presentation entitled "Efficiency of indirect selection for agronomic performance by multispectral vegetation indices".

Photos from the event are available below.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

The research team of the IoT-field project invites all interested agricultural producers/owners of OPGs to participate in the workshop Precision agriculture and continuous data collection from the field, which will be held on Wednesday, March 1, 2023, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Osijek Agricultural Institute, Juzno predgradje 17, Osijek. Participation in the workshop is free for all participants, but due to the organization and the limited number of participants, registration is required. Registration for participation is possible here until the scheduled places are filled, i.e. no later than February 27, 2023. The workshop will be held in Croatian.

About the workshop: The use of ICT and networked devices in agriculture can significantly improve the efficiency of land use and increase the quantity and quality of yields while reducing the negative impacts of climate change on the yields of crops of strategic importance for the Republic of Croatia. The goal of the workshop is to familiarize agricultural producers with the new smart system for monitoring the condition of crops, which is being developed as part of the scientific research project IoT-field.

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Paper presented at the international...

At the international scientific conference WFIoT 2022, held from October 31 to November 4, 2022 in Yokohama, Japan, a paper entitled "IoT Based Network Model And Sensor Node Prototype For Precision Agriculture Application" authored by Josip Spišić, Josip Balen, Dear Žagar and Vlatko Galić. The work was accepted after an international review process. This paper presents an IoT network model and a sensor node prototype for use in precision agriculture, which consists of an infrared sensor and a general-purpose microcontroller for collecting data from agricultural fields. The architecture of our model is extremely flexible and provides a machine learning data analysis solution that enables the processing of small-sized data at the edge of the network (sensor nodes) and the processing of large volumes of data in real-time from numerous nodes in the cloud. We use LoRaWAN™, a broadband network protocol as the transmission protocol in our solution, which has low power consumption, long range capability, is affordable and low maintenance, making it perfect for large fields and variable number of sensor nodes. According to the first device testing results presented in this paper, our device could provide an affordable means of spatio-temporal reading in the fields.

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Poster at the IV. International Plant...

At the IV. International Plant Breeding Congress held from November 21 to 25, 2022 in Antalya, Turkey, Tatjana Ledenčan presented a poster entitled "Using Newly Developed Proximal Sensors for High-Throughput Phenotyping in Maize Breeding" . The authors of the poster are Tatjana Ledenčan, Vlatko Galić, Josip Spišić, Zvonimir Zdunić, Ivana Podnar Žarko and Domagoj Šimić.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

On Friday, September 2, 2022, at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computing and Information Technologies in Osijek (FERIT), a scientific meeting "Application of new technologies in wine production" was held, which was organized as part of the ESIA (Expert System for Intelligent Agriculture) project - the "Development of an expert system for food production and processing management".

As part of this scientific meeting, associate professor Krešimir Grgić, PhD presented the project "An Ecosystem of Networked Devices and Services for IoT Solutions Applied in Agriculture", explaining the goals of the project, achieved results and application possibilities. Most of the gathered audience came from the viticulture and winemaking sectors, and during the presentation of the IoT-field project, they recognized the possibility of adaptation for application in this segment of smart agriculture as well. Although the focus of the IoT-field project is agricultural production (especially corn as a crop), the core part of the developed network and data infrastructure is universal, and with the adaptation of the sensor and application part, it could also be applied in other branches of smart agriculture.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

The research team of the IoT-field project invites all those interested to participate in the workshop "Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture" organized as part of the scientific meeting SST 2022 on Thursday, October 20th 2022, from 9:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. in Osijek, Hotel Osijek, Šamačka 4. The workshop will be held in English.

The workshop will present research results, developed technologies and solutions in the field of smart agriculture at the national level, along with a discussion of current research topics in the field of data-based precision agriculture.

Applications are possible via email at tihana.vajnand@ferit.hr!

Workshop programme

9:30 – 11:00

Josip Spišić, Ana Pejković, Matko Zrnić, Višnja Križanović, Krešimir Grgić and Drago Žagar 
LoRaWAN parameters optimization for efficient communication

Krunoslav Tržec, Mario Kušek and Ivana Podnar Žarko 
Building an Interoperable IoT Ecosystem for Data-Driven Agriculture

Dario Stuhne, Ivo Vatavuk, Ivan Hrabar, Goran Vasiljević and Zdenko Kovačić 
Automated Suckering of Vines with a Mobile Robot and a Torque-controlled Suckering Tool

Krešimir Grgić, Luka Balić, Višnja Križanović and Drago Žagar 
An example of indoor positioning possibility using WiFi network and mobile phone

Dora Krekovic and Ivana Podnar Žarko 
Prediction of Microclimate Parameters for Application in Precision Agriculture


11:30 – 13:00

Domagoj Šimić, Vlatko Galić, Josip Spišić, Maja Mazur, Tatjana Ledenčan and Zvonimir Zdunić
Field-Based High-Throughput Phenotyping Using Newly Developed Proximal Sensor Device

Monika Zovko
Sensory Monitoring and Modeling of Temporal and Spatial Phenomena in Agroecosystems Invited talk

Andrijana Rebekić
Digitalization in Agriculture - What Competencies Agronomist Needs Invited talk

Vlatko Galić
Digitizing the In-Field Agro-Ecological Reality - Goals, Achievements, Pitfalls
Invited talk

Discussion / Round table
 

Author: Katarina Mandarić

At the international scientific conference AICT 2022, held from June 26 to 30, 2022 in Porto, Portugal, the paper "Energy Efficiency of LoRa based Wireless Sensor Networks for Environmental Monitoring and Precision Agriculture" by V. Križanović, D. Ćaćić was presented , K. Grgić, D. Žagar. The work was accepted after an international review process.

In this paper, an analysis of the energy consumption of sensor nodes in Long Range (LoRa) wireless sensor networks used in agriculture for monitoring environmental parameters was carried out. The network configuration is analyzed with regard to energy consumption optimization in terms of choosing the appropriate network topology, node layout, data collection and routing process, as well as network radio parameter settings.

Križanović, V., Ćaćić, D., Grgić, K., Žagar, D. (2022). Energy Efficiency of LoRa based Wireless Sensor Networks for Environmental Monitoring and Precision Agriculture. In: Proceedings of The Eighteenth Advanced International Conference on Telecommunications (AICT 2022), Porto, Portugal, 2022. / S. Semenov (eds), ThinkMind

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić

At the 57th Croatian and 17th International Symposium of Agronomists from June 19 to 24, 2022 in Vodice in Croatia, an invited plenary presentation "Choice of Maize Maturity Group and Climate Change: Current Status and Predictions" was held by Zvonimir Zdunić, Antun Jambrović, Luka Andrić, Vlatko Galić and Domagoj Šimić. A paper was also published in the Proceedings of the Symposium, accepted after international peer review.

The idea of ​​this presentation and work was to show the interconnection of maize genotypes categorized according to ripening groups, environmental conditions and agronomic management for increasing future grain yields in conditions of climate change. It was pointed out that in the future, an integrative framework of genotype × environment × management interaction analysis together with high-throughput genotyping and phenotyping should be used. Even more important is the use of precision agriculture methods, machine learning and the Internet of Things to capture more relevant data and provide agricultural producers with crucial information in real time.

Zdunić, Z., Jambrović, A., Andrić, L., Galić, V., Šimić, D. (2022) Choice of Maize Maturity Group and Climate Change: Current Status and Predictions 

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Paper presented at the KES AMSTA 2022...

At the international scientific conference KES-AMSTA 2022, held in a hybrid form from June 20 to 22, 2022 in Greece on the island of Rhodes, the paper "Mobile Client for Crop Yield Prediction Based on Weather Data", authored by Ivan Kralj, Pavel Skočir and Gordan Ježić, was presented. The paper was accepted after an international review.

The paper describes the development of a simple mobile client that uses a simulator in the background to determine the sowing date that results in the highest crop yield. In the mobile application, the user selects a fixed sowing date interval and crop type to obtain the sowing date that gives the highest predicted yield.

Kralj, I., Skocir, P., Jezic, G. (2022). Mobile Client for Crop Yield Prediction Based on Weather Data. In: Jezic, G., Chen-Burger, YH.J., Kusek, M., Šperka, R., Howlett, R.J., Jain, L.C. (eds) Agents and Multi-Agent Systems: Technologies and Applications 2022. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 306. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-3359-2_4

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić
9th project meeting

On Wednesday, June 15, 2022, the 9th project meeting was held at FERIT in Osijek. As in the past in-person project meetings, this full-day meeting was attended by researchers and experts from FER, FERIT and PIO.

At the meeting, presentations of previous results and demonstrations of solutions were held, which were accompanied by constructive discussions and arguments from different points of view of our researchers and experts. The members of the project team had many words of praise for this meeting.

Photos from the meeting are available below the notification.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Second season of the urban garden at FER

Considering the great success of the urban garden set up at FER last year, the members of the Internet of Things Laboratory have set up an even bigger urban garden in the yard of FER again this year!
As well as last year, various sensors will monitor the condition of the tomatoes and peppers planted by our colleagues from the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Zagreb. The aim is to determine the influence of the selected substrate (which one part of the seedlings are enriched with) through the collected data from the sensors, plant condition and yield.

Check out how the set up of the garden and sensors took place last year, here.

Watch a video about the urban garden at FER, from September 2021 (in Croatian) here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Presentation of the project to high...

At the public presentation of the SmartSoc project held on April 11 2022, which was attended by high school students, our research assistant Katarina Mandarić presented the IoT field project, the urban smart garden set up in the FER yard and student projects in the field of smart agriculture that are implemented in the Internet of Things Laboratory, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, University of Zagreb.

Read more about the project and the event and other presentations held here (in Croatian).

Author: Katarina Mandarić
IoT-field project and FER urban...

Member of the research team, assistant Katarina Mandarić participated in the presentation of FER at the conference "Better education, better Croatia" organized by 24sata on Tuesday, April 5, 2022 at the Zagreb Innovation Center.

Katarina gave a presentation "Networked devices and IoT-services for digitalization of agriculture" about the project IoT-field. The urban garden that we set up last year in the yard of FER was also presented, as well as the student projects we run related to the field of smart agriculture.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

Last week, from Thursday November 25th to Saturday, November 27th, the University of Zagreb Summit was held. Among the presented FER projects was our urban garden set up as part of the IoT-field project.

For the Summit, we prepared a video about the urban garden and the IoT-field project in which you can see exactly where the urban garden is located, what it looked like in September, what the fruits were like, sensors that monitored the situation, project goals, etc.

Our researchers on the IoT-field project Katarina Mandarić, Ivan Kralj and Pavle Skočir presented the project, and recordings of the presentation are available on the Faculty’s YouTube channel (for example, the presentation on the 2nd day of the Festival is available here). The video and presentations are in Croatian language.

We are proud to have represented our Faculty, and even more proud that FER received the award for the most meaningful virtual stand at the Festival!

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Seventh project meeting

After a year in which numerous virtual meetings were held, the seventh project meeting was held live on Thursday, September 2, 2021 in Zagreb in the White Hall of FER. The all-day meeting was attended by researchers and experts from FER, FERIT and PIO.

Presentations of previous results and future activities were held at the meeting. Constructive discussions necessary for further successful cooperation of the multidisciplinary team on the project were conducted and clear guidelines for further work on the project were set.

The next day, on Friday, September 3, the junior researchers on the project held a meeting where they discussed their results, further plans and collaboration in more detail.

Photos from the meeting are available below (under "More...").

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Workshop "Smart technologies for...

On Thursday, July 1, 2021, the project team of the IoT field held a workshop Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture as part of the scientific conference ConTEL 2021. The workshop was held as a hybrid event and was attended by almost 50 interested participants from academia and the professional community, live and online.

Six papers that passed the international review were presented at the workshop, and three invited lectures were held.

More details, including the list of presented papers, presentations from the workshop and photos are available here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Presentation by Vlatko Galić, PhD at...

Member of the project team Vlatko Galić, PhD from the Agricultural Institute Osijek held a lecture on Tuesday, June 29, 2021 at a promotional seminar at the Faculty of Agrobiotechnical Sciences Osijek on the occasion of launching a new graduate university study "Digital Agriculture". The study programme will be held in English and conducted by the Faculty of Agrobiotechnical Sciences Osijek and the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Information Technology Osijek (FERIT) with the participation of professors and lecturers from abroad.

In his presentation, Vlatko Galić, PhD presented the IoT-field project, the system architecture and the sensor that we are developing as part of the project. The lecture also covered the topics of decision-making based on read sensory data, various problems of sensory readings and their interpretation, multispectral indices, fluorescence, etc.

You can see more about the promotional seminar and the new study programme in the report by Osijek Television here (language: Croatian).

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Monitoring crop condition in the...

On Wednesday, June 16, 2021, the research team of the IoT-field project organized a workshop New smart system for monitoring the condition of crops at the Agricultural Institute Osijek. Through the presentations of the researchers, the workshop participants were introduced to the details of the hardware and software solution for monitoring the condition of crops and environmental parameters in real time, which is being developed within this three-year project. After that, in the experimental field of corn of the Agricultural Institute, participants had the opportunity to see the first demonstration of a prototype of a chlorophyll fluorescence sensor that provides information about the physiological state of the plant, and is being developed within the project.

You can find out more details about the event and impressions from the workshop in articles published by journals Agroklub and in Glas Slavonije (in Croatian).

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Workshop "Smart technologies for...

The IoT-field team invites all interested parties to participate in the workshop "Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture", which is organized in the framework of the scientific conference ConTEL 2021.

The date of the workshop is Thursday, July 1, 2021 from 11:00 to 15:00 (lunch break from 12:30 to 13:30), and will be held as a hybrid event at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Zagreb. The program of the workshop is available here.

Participation in the online event is open to all registered guests, and the registration deadline is Wednesday, June 30, 2021. The workshop will be held in English.

Register here.

Author: Ivana Podnar Žarko

The research team of the IoT-field project invites all interested agricultural producers/family farm owners to participate in the workshop "New smart crop monitoring system", which will be held on Wednesday, June 16, 2021 from 10 am to 1 pm at the Agricultural Institute Osijek, Južno predgrađe 17, Osijek.

Participation in the workshop is free for all participants, but due to the organization and the limited number of participants, registration is required. Registration for participation is possible here until the planned places are filled, ie no later than June 11, 2021. The workshop will be held in Croatian. 

Sign up as soon as possible and secure your place!

About the workshop: The application of ICT and networked devices in agriculture can significantly improve the efficiency of land use and increase the quantity and quality of yields while reducing the negative effects of climate change on crop yields of strategic importance for the Republic of Croatia. The aim of the workshop is to acquaint agricultural producers with a new smart system for monitoring the condition of crops, which is being developed as part of the scientific research project IoT-field.

Workshop program:
Introductory speech
Prof. Zvonimir Zdunić, PhD, Agricultural Institute Osijek

Introductory about the IoT field project
Prof. Ivana Podnar Žarko, PhD, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing Zagreb

IoT ecosystem for agriculture - all field data in one place
Asst. Prof. Pavle Skočir, PhD, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing Zagreb
Krunoslav Tržec, PhD, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing Zagreb

Development of sensor node with application in precision agriculture
Josip Spišić, MSc, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Information Technology Osijek

Remote monitoring of the physiological state of the crop
Vlatko Galić, PhD, Agricultural Institute Osijek

Questions and discussion

Tour of the experiment

Refreshments and snacks

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Tomato and pepper garden at FER

On Wednesday, May 26, members of the Internet of Things Laboratory of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and COmputing University of Zagreb set up a real small garden in FER’s backyard as part of the IoT-Field project. Numerous sensors monitor the conditions for tomato and pepper seedlings planted by our University colleagues from the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Zagreb. While planting the seedlings, for the experiment we are conducting, part of the seedlings were enriched with substrate. The aim is to determine the influence of the selected substrate through the collected data from the sensor, plant condition and yield.

Given the effort and attention our garden has, we have no doubt of a rich harvest. In addition to our professors and assistants, students also joined the set-up process, spontaneously while passing by for which we thank them. Check out how we worked with non-program tools in the pictures below.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

On Sunday, April 25, 2021, Assoc. Prof. Domagoj Šimić from the Agricultural Institute Osijek was a guest on the radio show "Emisija za selo i poljoprivredu" (Show for Village and Agriculture) on the First Program of Croatian Radio.
Assoc. Prof. Domagoj Šimić describes the project "IoT-field", cooperation with FER and FERIT, introduction to the concept of "Internet of Things" and further plans of the project, given that the project is in its 2nd year and the installation of sensors in the fields has begun. In the interview, professor Šimić talks about the acceptance and application of smart agriculture in Croatia and how important it is to predict and take preventive action based on sensory and satellite data, and not just cause-and-effect.

The interview is in Croatian and it is available here, the interview starts at 0:19:42.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

As part of this year's ConTEL 2021 conference, a thematic workshop on Smart Agriculture Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture by the IoT-field project team will be held.

The scheduled date is July 1st 2021, and it will be organized as a hybrid event at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing in Zagreb if the epidemiological situation will be favorable.

In addition to the presentation of scientific and professional papers, one to two thematic lectures are planned, and potentially a round table.

The call for papers is currently open (deadline 12th April 2021), and more information about the event is available here.

Author: Katarina Mandarić

At 29th International Scientific Conference Organization and Maintenance Technology OTO 2020 the paper titled "Wireless technology for wide and open areas" was presented. It was written by researchers from FERIT - Ana Pejković, Josip Spišić, Matko Zrnić, Krešimir Grgić and Josip Balen

In the paper it's described that there are a large number of wireless technologies used for IoT, and they are designed for different applications with different characteristics. A comparison of the most practical wireless technologies for use in agriculture in wide and open areas is conducted and it is concluded that the key aspects of wide and open areas are long communication range and extended battery life. It has been concluded that technologies that meet these requirements are LoRa, Sigfox and NB-IoT. NB-IoT provides better service quality, lower latency and higher data rates while LoRa and Sigfox can provide a very low cost end node and high coverage with low power consumption for asynchronous communication with the gateway.

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Successful workshop Smart...

On Wednesday, October 14th, 2020 the workshop Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture was successfully organized within the scientific conference SST 2020, Osijek. The workshop was organized hybridly, i.e. it was possible to follow live and online. The workshop was attended by many interested parties from the academic community and industry.

The following presentations were held at the workshop:
Ivana Podnar Žarko and Vlatko Galić

  • IoT-field: project overview and initial results
    • Ivana Podnar Žarko and Vlatko Galić presented a view of the project from a technical and agronomic perspective with an overview of the initial results.

Damjan Katušić, Pavle Skočir, Mario Kušek and Igor Čavrak

  • Survey on Low Power Wide Area Networks in IoT
    • Pavle Skočir presented communication technologies with the potential of application in agriculture.

Krešimir Grgić, Drago Žagar, Josip Balen and Jelena Vlaović

  • Internet of Things in Smart Agriculture - Possibilities and Challenges
    • Krešimir Grgić described the role of the Internet of Things in precision agriculture and the opportunities that open up with the implementation of the Internet of Things in agriculture, but also the challenges that arise.

Jelena Vlaović, Josip Balen, Krešimir Grgić, Drago Žagar, Vlatko Galić, and Domagoj Šimić

  • An Overview of Chlorophyll Fluorescence Measurement Process, Meters and Methods
    • Josip Balen gave an overview of the process of measuring chlorophyll fluorescence, the necessary measuring instruments and methods.

Igor Hrovatič

  • FAIRhare, i2connect & WiseFarmer EU projects - Strong driver on Farmers digitalization
    • Igor Hrovatič, Head of the Slovenian Advisory Service at the Chamber of Agriculture and Forestry of Slovenia, presented the European Union projects “FAIRhare”, “i2connect” and “WiseFarmer” providing a consulting perspective in agriculture.

Pictures from the event are available in the extension of this news post under "More".

Author: Katarina Mandarić

 For the needs of the workshop Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture organized within the conference SST 2020, Osijek, an infographic describing the project was created.

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić
Workshop Smart technologies for...

The research project IoT-field invites all interested parties to participate in the workshop Smart technologies for sustainable agriculture organized within the scientific conference SST 2020, Osijek, on Wednesday October 14th 2020 from 1:45pm to 3:15pm. Participation in the online event will be available to all registered guests, and the deadline for registration is Tuesday October 13th 2020 until 2pm. The workshop will be held in English language.

Register here!

Author: Katarina Mandarić

After several meetings held online due to the situation with the pandemic, the second technical meeting was held live in Osijek at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Information Technology on Friday, September 4, 2020. The all-day meeting was attended by researchers and experts from FER, FERIT and PIO.

Constructive presentations and discussions necessary for the understanding and cooperation of the multidisciplinary team on the project were held at the meeting, and clear guidelines for further work on the project were set.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Author: Katarina Mandarić