Artificial intelligence in real-time evaluating electrical conductivity of greenhouse substrate

Abstract

To support decision-making in precision management of greenhouse cultivation, a portable electrical conductivity detector was developed to real-time measure substrate in greenhouse. It mainly included three units, probes, controlling and monitoring unit, and data processing and displaying unit. The probes were designed based on Four-electrode method. The controlling and monitoring unit provided a constant current into substrate and then measured the voltage drop between two points of substrate. Performance experiments under different conditions were conducted. The result revealed that, when water content was lower than 50%, the substrate electrical conductivity would be affected by both salinity and moisture in substrate. Therefore it was necessary to consider the factor of moisture when evaluating substrate property by substrate electrical conductivity. When water content was higher than 50%, substrate electrical conductivity was mainly affected by substrate salinity, and the effect of moisture could be ignored. © 2005 by International Federation for Information Processing.