Aiming at the problems of low precision, strong subjectivity, and continuous measurement in the current measurement methods of corn phenotypic traits, a method of measuring corn phenotypic traits with high precision, low cost, easy carrying and continuous measurement was proposed. Firstly, the three-dimensional scanning device Kinect 2.0 is used to collect corn information and process and reconstruct the collected point cloud. Then, the stem and leaf point clouds were segmented by straight-through filtering, ellipse fitting and region growth segmentation. Finally, the phenotypic parameters of corn were obtained by triangulation and plane fitting for the segmented corn leaves, and the accuracy was analyzed. The results showed that the accuracy of corn plant height was 97.622 %, the average relative error of stem long axis was 9.46 %, the average relative error of stem short axis was 11.17 %, and the accuracy of leaf area was 95.577 %. Studies have shown that this method provides a new method for continuous measurement of phenotypic traits in corn.

The working parameters of the pneumatic sprayer, such as the sprayers attitude, working airflow, and spraying amount, have an impact on the evenness of seed distribution during the process of vegetation restoration on degraded grasslands . This article focuses on the 4BQD-40C pneumatic sprayer and analyzes the impact of the sprayers forward speed, the airflow velocity at the sprayers inlet, and the frequency of the sprayers swinging nozzle on the spraying quality. The conclusion shows that: 1) the equation of the seed distribution trajectory of the sprayer was obtained, laying the foundation for subsequent research; 2) the swinging frequency of the nozzle is the key factor affecting the spraying quality of the sprayer, and the optimal swinging frequency of the nozzle corresponding to different forward speeds of the sprayer was obtained based on the established trajectory equation; 3) when the sprayer performs spraying operations with the optimized forward speed and swinging frequency, the trajectory of the sprayers seed distribution was analyzed. It was found that when the nozzle swings at each optimal frequency, the trajectory of the seed distribution is the same, and the sum of the re-sprayed and missed areas in the seed distribution area is equal.

Tree whitewash has the functions of parasite prevention and cold protection and is therefore commonly used in the maintenance and management of trees. At present, tree whitewash mainly relies on manual operation, which has the problems of low efficiency, poor quality, and uneven distribution of the whitewash agent. To address this issue, this study developed a smart tree whitewash device based on human–computer interaction. The device was controlled mainly by a programmable logic controller (PLC). Once the trunk information collected by sensors was received by the PLC, it would control the up and down motions of the ball screw to manipulate the mechanical arm for whitewash. In addition, a Mitsubishi GT12 touch screen was adopted to facilitate system operation. Subsequently, a whitewash experiment was performed on poplar trunks with lengths of 10–35 cm using three different whitewash devices, i.e., a backpack sprayer, a semi-automatic tree sprayer, and the proposed smart tree whitewash device; the efficiency and the amount of whitewash agents used were compared. The results suggested that as the tree diameter at breast height increased, the amount of required whitewash agent elevated accordingly. In this case, the time required by the backpack sprayer and the semiautomatic tree sprayer to complete the job both increased, whereas that required by the smart tree whitewash device remained almost identical. In terms of work efficiency, the time required by the smart whitewash device to whitewash a tree was 109.89 s, which was approximately 1/2 of the time required by the backpack sprayer or 2/3 of that required by the semiautomatic tree spraying device. Meanwhile, the amount of whitewash agent required by the smart whitewash device to whitewash a tree was 140.23 g, which was approximately 0.46 of the amount required by the backpack sprayer or 0.74 of that required by the semiautomatic tree spraying device. Therefore, it was concluded that the proposed smart tree whitewash device could not only improve the work efficiency of tree whitewash but also greatly reduce the amount of whitewash agent required, thereby decreasing the cost and minimising environmental pollution. This study provides theoretical guidance and technical support for future research on smart tree whitewash devices.

The article is focused on the determination of the nonlinear relationships between soil compaction, density, and water content. It was found that these properties can be described by the second-order models and used for improving devices for the on-stream soil density measuring. The models for determining the density of loamy soil (at a water content of 20%) in the range from 0.9 to 1.6 g/cm3 with an extremum of 1.35 g/cm3 were improved. A device for the on-stream soil density measuring is proposed. The device operates within the soil compaction range from 0.3 to 1.2 MPa and water content from 10 to 30% at the angle of inclination of the kinematic link ? from 15 to 40 degrees. The obtained results can be used in the adaptation of the proposed device for use in precision agriculture.

Thinning is an important agronomic process in pear production, thus the detection of pear inflorescence is an important technology for intelligentization of blossom thinning. In this paper, images of buds and flowers were collected under different natural conditions for model training, and the images were augmented by data augmentation methods. Model training was performed based on the YOLOv5s network with coordinate attention mechanism added to the backbone network and compared with the native YOLOv5s, YOLOv3, SSD 300, and Faster-RCNN algorithms. The mAP, F1 score and recall of the algorithm reached 93.32%, 91.10%, and 91.99%. The model size only took up 14.1 MB, and the average detection time was 27 ms, which are suitable for application in actual intelligent blossom thinning equipment.

In order to improve the level of forage harvester automation and reduce damage, blockage and efficiency, based on the principle of minimum energy, fuzzy prediction theory and external characteristics of power, the mathematical model of the whole machine and each operating unit is established, and a set of forage harvester operating load adaptive feedback control system is designed; in order to make the power more scientifically and effectively distributed in real-time, the system adopts the simplified algorithm of operating unit efficacy threshold load splitting optimization control, with constant power and high efficiency. In order to make the power distribution more scientific and effective in real-time, the system adopts the simplified algorithm of operating unit efficacy threshold load splitting control to increase the load threshold of cutting and other operating units under constant power conditions, so that the operating efficiency of the whole machine can be improved. In the simulation test, the efficacy chopping load threshold ratio is about 1.08:1.01:1 for the three operation control methods of optimized control, fuzzy predictive control and PID control of the forage harvester, with 40% of the original feeding amount perturbation applied respectively. production efficiency was significantly improved.

In traditional Chinese Baijiu (white wine) brewing factory, most processes were usually done manually. In order to promote industrial automation in liquor brewing industry and alleviate highly repetitive manual labor, an industrial robot operating system equipped with machine vision was designed to accomplish caldron feeding process during the distillation of Chinese Baijiu. Firstly, Modified D-H method was used to establish robot kinematics model. Shovel actuators and peripheral devices were designed to spread and transport grains during caldron feeding process. After that, an online detection system based on machine vision and master computer were designed to control key parameters of caldron feeding process, including grains height, caldron pressure, robot speed and waiting time, etc. Finally, multiple brewing experiments were carried out on crushed grains and spent grains. The experimental results showed that robot system maximum working space was 3.15 m, which could feed 3 caldrons at the same time. During Chinese Baijiu distillation, air pressure average error in caldron was 8.28 %. High proportion of first-class liquor and second-class liquor was obtained, which met engineering production requirements.

Purwoceng (Pimpinella pruatjan Molkenb) is a medicinal plant native to Indonesia known as Indonesian Viagra from Java. The decline and scarcity of Purwoceng is an important obstacle in meeting the demands of harvesting from the original habitat without conservation and the extreme climatic conditions in the Dieng plateau. Therefore, it is necessary to apply controlled cultivation technology, namely hydroponic technology with drip irrigation in the greenhouse, to increase the yield and quality of Purwoceng. This study aimed to obtain the effect of hydroponic methods and hydroponic nutrition (EC) on the yield and quality of Purwoceng. The study was conducted from December 2020 to March 2021 at a greenhouse of ± 1500 m above sea level. The experiment used a randomized block design with three replications. Each replication consisted of 15 plants. Hydroponic type, which was recirculating drip, non-circulating drip, and nutrient concentration which were 1000 ppm, 1500 ppm, and 2000 ppm. The harvest weight (aerial part and root), moisture, ash, crude fat, crude fiber, water extractive, and ethanol extractive content, and the contaminant (microbial and heavy metal) content, were analyzed. In conclusion, to produce high-quality Purwoceng, a hydroponic system could be used using recirculating drip and 1000 ppm nutrient dose.

In order to solve the problems of low efficiency of fertilization and spraying in the hilly mountains of China, a vehicle-mounted fertilization and spraying machine was designed. The whole structure and working principle of the machine were described, and the key components of fertilization and spraying are designed. The kinetics and kinematics of fertilizer particles and droplets were modeled by theoretical analysis of their motion characteristics in the air. The fertilization and variable spraying control system based on the core controller MCU (Microcontroller Unit) was set up. And the system can adjust the rotational speed of the disc and can automatically change the spraying volume by real-time detection of forward speed to achieve a constant spraying volume per unit area. The test results showed that: when the disc speed was greater than 90 r/min, the uniformity coefficient of variation was less than 15%, which satisfied the operational requirements; the uniformity coefficient of variation reached the minimum value of 10.03% when the disc rotation speed was 180 r/min, and the best fertilization performance was achieved at this time. In the spraying system, the actual spraying volume increased with the increased forward speed, and the relative error between the theoretical flow rate and the actual flow rate was 6.25% at most, and the average error was 5.94%, which could achieve the purpose of variable spraying. The research results can provide technical reference for the design and development of fertilization and spraying machinery in hilly areas.

Soil nutrient content is an important index to evaluate the growing environment of crops. Rapid access to soil nutrient information is an important requirement for the development of modern precision agriculture, while the detection of soil organic matter content is a necessary condition for understanding the basic soil fertility and implementing crop precision cultivation. In this paper, the soil of rural fields in the southeast of Shanxi Province before sowing was taken as the research object. 111 soil samples to be tested were collected. After the process of drying, impurity removal and grinding, the hyperspectral data of the Region of interest (ROI) of the samples were collected, and then the chemical determination of soil organic matter content was conducted. The original spectral data matrix was pretreated by numerical transformation operations, such as arithmetic mean, average deviation, 1st derivation, natural logarithm and mixed multiplication, and a Partial least square regression (PLSR) quantitative analysis model was established. In these models, the obtained prediction set RP value under the pretreatment of F(A)*ln(AD) was the highest, reaching 0.8859. For spectral data preprocessed by F(A)* Ln (AD), the Competitive adaptive reweighted sampling (CARS) algorithm and Random frog (RF) algorithm were used to select key variables. The PLSR model was established by using F(A)* Ln (AD)&CARS data processing method, and the RP value was increased to 0.9545. The prediction results can accurately reflect the real content of soil organic matter. The results of this study can provide theoretical support for the application of hyperspectral imaging technology in the determination of soil organic matter content, and provide a reference for the rapid detection of other soil components.

To explore the application of traditional machine learning model in the intelligent management of pigs, in this paper, the influence of Principal Components Analysis (this method is simply referred to as PCA) pre-treatment on pig face identification with Support Vector Machine (this method is simply referred to as SVM) is studied. By testing method, the kernel functions of two testing schemes, one adopting SVM alone and the other adopting PCA+SVM, were determined to be poly and Radial Basis Function, whose coefficients were 0.03 and 0.01, respectively. With individual identification tests carried out on 10 pigs respectively, the identification accuracy was increased to 88.85% from 83.66% by the improved scheme, also the training time as well as testing time were reduced to 30.1% and 20.97% of the original value in the earlier scheme, respectively. It indicates that PCA pre-treatment had a positive effect on improving the efficiency of individual pig identification with SVM. It provides experimental support for the mobile terminals and embedded application of SVM classifiers.

Mechanized harvesting of crops is very important in the field of agricultural engineering, then the brush harvesting is a common way. The comb brush device is divided into four types: comb tooth type, roller spring finger type, belt comb finger type, and rod comb finger type. The picking rate and breakage rate are the indexes to evaluate the effect of comb brush harvesting devices. How to improve the picking rate and reduce damage rate is of great significance to the popularization of the devices. To improve the picking rate, the design of comb teeth should conform to the growth characteristics of crops. In this study, the application of four comb brush devices in harvesting crops was introduced, then the working principles and results were summarized. Meanwhile, the research status of a variable finger spacing device was summarized. In addition, to study fruit damage caused by brush devices during harvesting, three common analysis methods were summarized. The application situations and key steps were listed, and the modeling methods of material fruit in simulation analysis were analyzed. The study is intended to provide a reference for improving the harvesting effect of comb brush device. In the future, with the deepening combination of agronomy and agricultural machinery technology, comb brush harvesters will be more widely applied.

In order to solve the problem that the complex pig house environment leads to the difficulty and low accuracy of abnormal detection of group pigs. The video of 9 adult fattening pigs were collected, and the video key frames were obtained by the frame differential method as the training set, and the YOLOX model for abnormal detection of group pigs was constructed. The results show that the average accuracy of YOLOX model on the test set is 98.0%. The research results can provide a reference for the detection of pig anomalies in the breeding environment of pig farms.

In the seedling extraction mechanism of the ejection type, because the ejector rod is in direct contact with the seedling substrate, the fragmentation rate of the seedling is high, the success rate is low, and the seedling effect is poor. In order to solve this problem, combined with the interaction between the ejector rod and the bowl seedling, this paper analyzes the working principle of the ejector rod conveyor belt seedling harvesting mechanism, and optimizes the design of the ejector rod conveyor belt seedling harvesting mechanism. By using the method of EDEM simulation analysis and orthogonal experiment, taking the breaking rate and success rate of bowl seedling as the test response index, the effects of ejector rod end form, ejector rod diameter and seedling extraction speed were studied, and the results were analyzed by range analysis and variance analysis to analyze the influence law of the interaction of various factors on bowl seedling extraction. The simulation results show that the crushing rate of bowl seedlings increases with the increase of seedling speed and the decrease of ejector diameter. Among the three different types of ejectors, the effect of round head ejector is the best. The best parameter combination of the seedling mechanism is the diameter of the ejector rod 10mm, the seedling speed 2m/s, and the ejector rod in the form of round head ejector rod. The verification experiment shows that the seedling extraction effect of the optimized seedling extraction mechanism is better than that of the original seedling extraction mechanism. The results show that when the best combination of working parameters is used to collect seedlings, the qualified rate of seedlings is not less than 90%, the fragmentation rate is not higher than 20%, and the seedling performance is relatively stable. The optimized seedling extraction mechanism can be used in the automatic dryland bowl seedling transplanter to meet the operational requirements of the automatic transplanter.

One of the main factors in the poultry house is maintaining a standardized microclimate. The quality of the product output in the final result depends precisely on the quality indicators of the air parameters. Poultry during its maintenance requires significant efforts and technological solutions. In this regard, authors improved microclimate system in air environment of the poultry house by installing exhaust fans on the side wall in a total number of 8 units. CFD modeling using ANSYS Fluent is a powerful tool for predicting the air flow scheme in a poultry house and is considered an alternative to experimental studies. Based on the obtained results of CFD modeling, it was established that the valves located at a height of 330 mm from the ceiling work most efficiently. Pressure drop for the inlet valves is 45.85 Pa. Air velocity at the inlet of the supply valves is equal to 9.17 m/s. Air velocity at a height of 0.7 m from the floor level varies within 0.57 m/s, the temperature is 9.91 °?.

To address the problems of high breakage rates, high entrainment losses and many unthreshed kernels when harvesting high moisture content maize seeds, a high moisture content maize seed threshing test was designed based on a multifunctional seed harvester stand designed by this group.In order to determine the optimum operating parameters of the threshing unit, single-factor experiments and orthogonal tests were carried out using the threshing drum speed, concave plate clearance and feed rate as test factors and the crushing rate, unthreshing rate, entrained loss rate and trash content rate as test evaluation indicators.The optimum combination of test factors obtained for the harvesting of maize at 32% to 34% moisture content was a drum speed of 346.55r/min, a concave plate clearance of 44.39mm and a feed rate of 9.739Kg/s.After repeated experiments on the bench, the test results with optimum parameters were 6.311% crushing rate, 0.187% unthreshing rate, 0.912% entrained loss rate and 4.251% impurity rate, at which point the crushing rate was the lowest and the other three met national standards.

Aiming at the potato cropping pattern in the hilly area of southwest China, a small digging device for potato harvester was designed. First, the overall structure of the harvester was determined according to the soil physical characteristic and cropping pattern of the test site. Then, the digging shovel, the key components of harvester were designed and was analyzed the relationship between the inclination of the digging shovel and the power loss under the conditions of different digging speed, digging depth and soil bulk density by MATLAB software, and the mathematical models were established. Finally, the three-dimensional model of the whole machine was established by SolidWorks, and the simulation experiment was carried out with the model of soil particles, potato particles and potato ridges created by the discrete element (DEM) software. The simulation results show that when the working speed of the harvester is 1 m/s, the digging depth is 170 mm, and the potato expose rate is 87.3%. Under normal working conditions of the digging device, appropriately reducing the digging depth can reduce the resistance and wear of the digging shovels.

In order to further improve the seeding performance of the maize seed-metering device, a pressure-holding precision seed-metering device for maize was designed. The seed-metering device is made up of several seed rowing modules, which effectively solves the problems of inconvenient disassembly and complex maintenance of the current maize seed-metering device. The working principle of the device was introduced, and the mechanical and kinematic analysis of the maize seeds during the seeding operation was carried out. The orthogonal test was carried out with the installation diameter of seed-metering device s guide plate, torsion spring s wire diameter and seed-metering device s rotational speed as the test factors, the single-seeding rate, missed-seeding rate and multiple-seeding rate as the indexes, and the relationship between different test factors on the performance of seed-metering device was obtained. By optimizing the model, the best performance of the seed-metering device was obtained when the installation diameter of the guide plate was 92.32 mm, the wire diameter of the torsion spring was 1.59 mm, and the rotational speed of the seed-metering device was 0.41 r/s. At this time, the single-seed rate was 93.08%, the missed-seeding rate was 3%, and the multiple-seeding rate was 3.9%, which met the requirements of the industry standard.

This study aims to develop a fish grater machine to produce shredded fish on a household scale. The development of this fish shredder machine considers getting the maximum capacity, a minimum percentage of losses, a maximum percentage of the samples with short grade and middle grade size, and a maximum percentage of the samples with rough grade size with limited sources specified power. The method used in this research is the machine manufacturing and testing approach. Three types of shredder machine teeth (K-type, P-type, and B-type) are the main focus of this research to optimize the quality of the shredded material and the machines performance. The machine capacity, the percentage of losses, and the optimal quality of the counting size of the developed machine can be achieved using K-type shredder machine teeth. Analysis of variance and the t-test are used simultaneously to determine the optimal performance of this machine. The results of this study suggest that using a K-type shredder machine teeth is the most appropriate shredder machine for shredded fish.

In order to use the resonance principle for vibratory picking of Camellia oleifera fruit, the frequency sweep tests were carried out on the fruiting branches of Camellia oleifera trees. The results showed that the acceleration response of fruit-bearing branches had good consistency. The use of fruit removal rate alone to evaluate the picking effect is not reliable, and the introduction of energy utilization to evaluate the vibration picking effect is significant. The best results were a vibration frequency of 8 Hz and an excitation time of 10 s. The fruit removal rate was 88.12% and the energy utilization rate was 36.72%. Compared with the traditional fruit shedding rate, the application of energy utilization rate to evaluate the picking effect can improve the reliability of the results and reduce the energy loss.

The betel vine, a species of Piper, has organic impacts on human health through its secondary metabolites. Historically, it has been used to treat various illnesses including liver and stomach problems, inflammation, and as an antioxidant, antipyretic, and antimicrobial. Despite its medicinal benefits, the black betel vine (Piper betle var. Nigra) is not widely cultivated. This review summarises traditional and advanced methods of betel cultivation, including the habitats and diseases affecting Piper Betle L. There are two cultivation systems: closed-type and open-type, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. The modern method of propagation through callus induction is gaining popularity, but requires specialised knowledge and is more costly. Traditional cultivation is less complicated, but exposes young plants to disease. Implementing smart farming practices, maintaining optimal growth conditions, and utilizing a screen house with artificial shading and lighting may lead to higher-quality crops with reduced losses. Before planting, the cuttings should be soaked in a fungicide mixture and grown as individual plants to avoid bacterial leaf blight from occurring.

The automatic detection of wheat ears in the field has important scientific research value in yield estimation, gene character expression and seed screening. The manual counting method of wheat ears commonly used by breeding experts has some problems, such as low efficiency and high influence of subjective factors. In order to accurately detect the number of wheat ears in the field, based on mobilenet series network model, deep separable convolution module and alpha channel technology, the yolov4 model is reconstructed and successfully applied to the task of wheat ear yield estimation in the field. The model can adapt to the accurate recognition and counting of wheat ear images in different light, viewing angle and growth period, At the same time, the model volume with different alpha parameters is more suitable for mobile terminal deployment. The results show that the parameters of the improved yolov4 model are five times smaller than the original model, the average detection accuracy is 76.45%, and the detection speed FPS is two times higher than the original model, which provides accurate technical support for rapid yield estimation of wheat in the field.

The relevance of the study is due to the need to reduce the energy intensity of the process of cutting sunflower stalks by choosing a rational profile of knives. The research is based on a comparative analysis of experimental values of cutting forces for the proposed and manufactured design of the knife system and known knife systems. The studies have shown that the implementation of the retaining and main knives of the header in the form of a curved spiral of Archimedes allowed to reduce the cutting force. It was also found that the cutting force for the proposed design of the knife system, unlike other studied, practically does not change with the removal of the stem from the axis of rotation of the knives, which does not require an increase in energy costs for the cutting process.

The betel vine, a species of Piper, has organic impacts on human health through its secondary metabolites. Historically, it has been used to treat various illnesses including liver and stomach problems, inflammation, and as an antioxidant, antipyretic, and antimicrobial. Despite its medicinal benefits, the black betel vine (Piper betle var. Nigra) is not widely cultivated. This review summarises traditional and advanced methods of betel cultivation, including the habitats and diseases affecting Piper Betle L. There are two cultivation systems: closed-type and open-type, each with its own advantages and disadvantages. The modern method of propagation through callus induction is gaining popularity, but requires specialised knowledge and is more costly. Traditional cultivation is less complicated, but exposes young plants to disease. Implementing smart farming practices, maintaining optimal growth conditions, and utilizing a screen house with artificial shading and lighting may lead to higher-quality crops with reduced losses. Before planting, the cuttings should be soaked in a fungicide mixture and grown as individual plants to avoid bacterial leaf blight from occurring.

A peanut harvest separation and conveying device was designed considering the shortage of peanut harvest machinery and poor harvesting effect in China. The interaction between mechanism and pod-soil mixture was analysed to obtain the motion state of peanut relative separation conveyor. ADAMS simulation was applied to obtain the spatial curve of peanut trajectory in the separation process. The study determined that the optimum operating parameters of the separation conveyor were a drum speed of 280 r/min and an inclination angle of 19°. This study provides a theoretical basis for the further design of efficient peanut harvesting device.

Because of the high similarity of leaves of different Cerasus humilis varieties, it is difficult to identify them with the naked eye. In this study, the leaves of four different Cerasus humilis varieties collected in the field were used as the research objects, and a new leaf recognition model based on the improved lightweight convolution neural network model EfficientNet-B0 was proposed. Firstly, the performance of the network models Efficientnet-B0 and ResNet50, GoogleNet, ShuffleNet, and MobileNetV3 were compared based on two different learning methods. Then, the influence of different optimizers on model recognition accuracy was compared based on the optimal model. Finally, different learning rates were used to optimize the optimal model. The results show that the recognition rate of the proposed Efficientnet-B0 +Ranger+0.0005 model was up to 86.9%, which was 2.23% higher than that of the original Efficientnet-B0 model. The results show that this method can effectively improve the recognition accuracy of Cerasus humilis auriculate leaves, which can provide a reference for the deployment of the leaf identification model of Cerasus humilis variety on the mobile terminal.

A sunken solar greenhouse is the original type of greenhouse in China, its soil wall thermal storage performance is better and low cost. Higher benefits of stereoscopic planting in sunken solar greenhouses, while repeated use of the substrate can produce pathogens, so high-temperature smothering is used for sterilization in the summer months of June to August. To investigate the mechanism of indoor temperature and humidity variation and fungicidal effect in a sunken solar greenhouse, a single cross-sectional test of temperature and humidity in sunken solar greenhouse during the smothering period was conducted using wireless sensors. The results showed that: The maximum value of indoor temperature at noon was 69.5°C the temperature value of all measurement points was greater than 50°C for 3h, when removing the measurement points at the upper surface of the ground, the relative humidity value of other measurement points was less than 60% for 5h. During the daytime period, when the indoor temperature is greater than 28°C in the interval 7:00-12:00, the initial relative humidity value of each measurement point is located at 70%-85%; when the weighted temperature of each measurement point starts to rise at a rate of 1.1°C/10min, the weighted humidity of each measurement point declining is 1.3%/10min; the determination of the rate of change of indoor temperature and humidity during the daytime and the starting value can provide a basis for indoor plants to take measures to sterilize at high temperature.

Considering the planting mode and agronomics requirements of the existing facilities, the high-power rototilling ridge hoisting and lamination machine is difficult to operate in the greenhouse of the facility, and the small hanging rotary ridge raiser has technical problems such as insufficient horsepower. This paper designs the hanging rotary tillage ridging and film - covering machine. The machine realizes a single operation process to complete rotary tillage, ridging, drip irrigation, film laying and film edge covering soil suppression and other mechanized compound operations. The innovatively designed adjustable ridging device of this machine can steplessly adjust the size of the ridge. The ridge height after operation of the machine is 25-35 cm, the ridge width is 70-80 cm, the ridge shape is arc-shaped, the size is adjustable, and the operation efficiency is improved being 0.17-0.23 hectares/hour, the machine driving speed is set at low speed 1 gear. The machine has high operating efficiency, the arc-shaped ridge body is uniform and compact. the ridge body has a large lighting surface, the film is tightly laid, and it is close to the ridge surface without wrinkling. By test data analysis, the tillage depth stability is 93%, the ridge height qualified rate is 100%, the ridge width qualified rate is 85%, the ridge spacing qualified rate is 95%, the film edge covered soil thickness is 40 mm, the working efficiency is 0.802 hm2/h, the fuel consumption per hectare is 9.02 kg·h/m2, and the three shifts work without fault. To sum up, it meets the agronomic requirements of ridging and film planting.

Shell-and-tube heat exchangers are widely used in many research fields and industrial production processes, but little research has been conducted on the use of heat exchangers for drying crops. This study conducted a numerical simulation of the temperature, velocity, and pressure fields based on the shell-and-tube fluids of a heat exchanger in a biomass particle hot-blast stove. The correctness of the simulation results was verified by test data before simulation, and the mesh was verified to be irrelevant. The application of a multi-objective genetic algorithm in heat exchanger design and optimization was explored, considering five design variables, such as hot tube diameter, transverse pitch, longitudinal pitch, cold flow velocity, and hot flow velocity for optimization. The Nusselt number, friction factor, and comprehensive performance coefficient were used as objective functions for 2D and 3D response surface analysis. The final design variables P1=74.91 mm, P2=104.23 mm, P3=121.37 mm, P4=4.83 m/s, and P5=8.48 m/s were obtained to improve the comprehensive performance coefficient by 16.11%. The heat transfer performance was improved by 9.55% and the resistance performance was reduced by 15%

Mechanical weeding in paddy fields is a green and environmentally friendly way to control weeds, which has the advantages of reducing the amount of pesticides and improving the physical structure of the soil. This paper briefly describes the composition and relevant parameters of the mechanical weeding environment in rice fields. Using Creo 5.0, HyperMesh 2017, and LS-PrePost and LS-DYNA software to jointly simulate the interaction process between inverted V-shaped inter-plant weeding component and the soil in the paddy field, the single-point ALE multi-material unit algorithm is used to couple the soil and water with multiple substances, and realize the material movement between the soil and the water layer. Using the penalty function method, a fluid-solid coupling finite element modelled on the interaction between inter-plant weeding components and soil-water was established. The dynamic behavior of the interactions shows that the coupling stress increases and then decreases periodically, and the teeth of the spring cross the soil with a "bending moon (fish scale)" scratch, which can effectively avoid rice seedlings and reduce the injury rate.

This paper describes the design and implementation of a wireless sensor based on NB-IoT (Narrow Band Internet of Things) for monitoring agricultural environmental information. The sensor is capable of real-time monitoring of four environmental parameters, including ambient temperature, relative humidity, illuminance, and CO2 concentration. In the hardware design, sensor elements are selected based on the measurement ranges and accuracies specified in agricultural environmental monitoring industry standards. The hardware circuit is designed using the BC35-G type NB-IoT module and STM32 MCU (Microcontroller Unit). In the software design, data from the environmental parameters are collected and processed by the STM32 MCU and sent to the OneNET cloud platform through the NB-IoT module. The OneNET cloud platform enables users to view the relevant environmental data collected by the sensors using mobile phones and other mobile terminals. To test the effectiveness of the developed sensors, they were tested in a glass greenhouse at Fuyang Ziqing Agricultural Technology Co., Ltd. in Anhui Province. The results demonstrate that the sensors can accurately collect the data of relevant environmental parameters and can provide stable wireless transmission of data remotely, making them suitable for practical engineering applications. In summary, this wireless remote monitoring sensor based on NB-IoT represents a significant advancement in the field of agricultural automation. The sensors ability to accurately monitor and wirelessly transmit data in real-time provides farmers with valuable information to optimize crop growth and maximize yields.

The key to diagnosing the types and degree of apple leaf diseases is to correctly segment apple leaf disease spots. Therefore, in order to effectively solve the problem of poor segmentation of leaves and diseased areas, the U2Net semantic segmentation network model was used in the research of apple leaf disease identification and disease diagnosis, and compared with the classic semantic segmentation network model DeepLabV3+ and UNet. In addition, the effects of different learning rates (0.01, 0.001, 0.0001) and optimizers (Adam, SGD) on the performance of U2Net network model were compared and analyzed. The experimental results showed that the learning rate is 0.001 and the optimizer is Adam, the average pixel accuracy (MPA) and mean intersection over union (MIoU) of the research model for lesion segmentation reach 98.87% and 84.43%, respectively. The results of this study were expected to provide the theoretical basis for the precise control of apple leaf disease.

For many years, global researches that focus on improving soil fertility have been conducted. Nowadays, innovative inculcations of environmentally (ecologically) friendly organic agriculture are becoming quite popular. One of the most effective indicators is the use of alternative types of fertilizers. As part of large-scale experiments, researchers propose to use fertilizers made from organic sapropel concentrated in freshwater lakes. Analysis of such studies shows that the impact of sapropel on soil fertility is significant and complex. The main problem they faced is the extraction of these deposits from underwater deposits (fields). Ukrainian scientists have proven the effectiveness of sapropel extraction by means of a pneumatic intake device. To substantiate the rational parameters of this device and visualize the processes, experimental studies of the work of the pneumatic working body were carried out. Namely, experimental studies of the determination of the trajectories of air bubbles in liquids of different viscosity were carried out. According to received trajectories, the boundaries of airflow and its shape are determined. Limpid liquids of different viscosities were used specially in order to see and fix the flow parameters, because it is impossible to observe such a phenomenon in sapropels placed in underwater deposits, due to their opacity and change of viscosity with depth of the bedding. Therefore, the experiment was considered as close as possible to the real one, and the environment of realization of the experiment was simulated. Water, industrial oil and concentrated detergent were selected as investigated liquids. Research data indicate that one can use a whirling airflow for better loosening of deposits of reduced humidity. Whirling occurs when there is a horizontal position of the outlet axis with a diameter in the range of 1-1.5 mm and air pressure of 300-400 kPa.

Economic efficiency of greenhouse vegetable growing depends quite significantly on the cost of energy carriers, which is why the introduction of energy-saving technologies in greenhouse vegetable growing is an urgent issue. One of the ways to save energy resources can be the use of a closed ventilation system of the "plant greenhouse - mushroom greenhouse" type, which is based on the opposite type of respiration of plants and mushrooms. A closed ventilation system includes air exchange between the greenhouse with growing plants and the cultivation room for growing mushrooms. The closed ventilation system allows you to save energy by reducing the heating of the incoming air, as well as increasing the yield of vegetable products due to the increased concentrations of carbon dioxide in the air that flows from the cultivation room for mushrooms to the greenhouse and mushrooms due to the increased concentrations of oxygen in the air that flows into the cultivation room for mushrooms from the greenhouse. Mathematical modeling of the process of heat transfer between greenhouses makes it possible to simulate transitional processes between rooms in order to assess the quality and accuracy of regulation, as well as to evaluate the parameters of the object in transitional modes. Mathematical modeling of dynamic processes is the basis for the formulation of transfer functions for the automatic control system. As a result of the study, mathematical models of the temperature dynamics of the substrate of mushrooms and greenhouse vegetables were obtained due to the analytical solution of the system of differential equations. The adequacy of the solution was verified by the Runge-Kutta method and compared with experimental data. The difference between the theoretical and experimental values is not significant and amounted to -3 % for the substrate temperature and -3.2 % for the air temperature.

A kiwifruit harvesting end effector was designed and developed to improve the efficiency of mechanized kiwifruit harvesting. Firstly, the automated kiwifruit picking process was determined according to the kiwifruit orchard working environment. Secondly, the end-effector was designed and analyzed based on the principle of kiwifruit picking. Finally, an orchard experiment was conducted with the clamping force, rotation angle and rotation speed of the end-effector as test factors, and the separation success rate, separation time and damage rate of kiwifruit fruit as test indicators. A regression model between the test factors and test indicators was established using a quadratic fitting equation to analyze the influence between the test factors and indicators. The experimental results showed that the optimal parameter was a clamping force of 3.05 N, a separation angle of 65.75°, and a separation speed of 60.03°/s. The results of the study provide theoretical basis and technical support for automated kiwifruit harvesting.

The domestic rice industry of Ethiopia is constrained by low productivity, poor quality, and old processing machines. The rice production system is done by hand or with rudimentary tools, and only 2% of households have access to tractors. It takes 175 labor days to weed and 66% of the total farm operations. Rice harvesting and threshing are done manually using a serrated sickle and animal trembling respectively. Farmers are responsible for most of the pre-milling operations and store paddy for household consumption in local stores. Challenges include fragmented farm holdings, poor marketing channels, and a lack of awareness of post-harvest utilization. The prospects for rice mechanization development include improving the rice mechanization research system, training local entrepreneurs, providing repair and maintenance services, promoting custom hiring centers, local manufacturing of farm implements, organizing agricultural cooperatives, landholding, and land ownership structures, assessing foreign experience, linking importers and service providers, and encouraging investments in the rural infrastructure.

Goat milk kefir has high nutritional value, especially in protein and calcium content and has a low lactose content. Vacuum drying is an alternative to remove the water content in kefir so that it can extend the shelf life because it inhibits bacterial growth. This study determines the effect of aging time and drying time using vacuum drying method on the characteristics and amino acid composition of goat milk kefir (kefir and powder kefir). Fermented goat milk (24 hours) use kefir grains without aging and with aging times of 1, 2, 3, 4 (week). The total titrated acid and fat content were significantly different in kefir, but it is not significantly different in powder kefir. The yield, moisture, ash, protein, fiber, and fat in both kefir and powder kefir did not show significant differences. The best treatment based on the exponential comparison method for both powder kefir and kefir was 3 weeks of aging time. Therefore, the amino acid components in powder kefir and kefir underwent changes. The highest total amino acids in kefir was kefir without aging. The highest amino acid of powder kefir was obtained after 2 weeks of aging time.

In this study, a fluidized coffee roaster has been successfully designed, constructed, and tested. This prototype has a capacity of 500 grammes per batch to aid small-scale coffee shops in roasting coffee beans. This fluidized coffee roaster is easy to use, cheap and has an appropriate capacity for the small business requirements. The coffee roasting components of the machine consisted of a blower (600 watts), a heat exchanger, a jet burner, a cylindrical roasting chamber, a chaff and dust collector, and a frame. At a range of airflow of 4-6 m/sec, the average temperature increase in the furnace and roasting chamber was 26 °C and 7.8 °C per minute, respectively. Performance tests revealed that the developed fluidized coffee roaster had been able to roast Robusta and Arabica coffee to light, medium, and dark roasting levels. For Robusta coffee, the time required to achieve light, medium, and dark levels were 8.18, 9.85, and 12.03 minutes, respectively, with final roasting temperatures for each level of 209 °C, 220 °C, and 248°C. For Arabica coffee, the time required was 5.32, 7.67, and 11.72 minutes, respectively with the final roasting temperatures of 207 °C, 210 °C, and 218 °C.

The article defines the influence of the traction resistance of the machine-tractor unit working tool on the weight distribution of the tractor along the running system axles. Depending on the type of field work, the resistance force of tools aggregated with a tractor has a different value, accordingly, the tractor has a different weight distribution along the axles and, thus, different ground pressure. An increase in pressure on the soil leads to additional costs for tillage, and in the future to a decrease in agricultural production efficiency. The article presents a mathematical model for determining the reactions of the soil, and, accordingly, the pressure of tractor engines on the ground, depending on the structural parameters of the tractor, its adequacy estimation, and an example of calculating the weight distribution along the tractor axles.

In the buckwheat industry, buckwheat sizing effect has played a significant role in the subsequent hulling effect and food quality in its deep processing. In order to study the influence of inclination angle of linear vibrating screen on buckwheat sizing effect, EDEM was used for numerical simulation of sizing process with the inclination angle of the screen separately at 2°, 3°, 4°, and 5°. By observing particle distribution on the screen deck and calculating the different types of particles in various statistical areas, qualitative comparison and quantitative analysis on the conveying capability of the screen and the penetrating capability of particles at different inclination angles were made, and the results revealed that with the increase in the inclination angle of the screen, the conveying capability of the screen was enhanced, while particles became less capable of penetrating through the sieve. When the inclination angle was increased from 2° to 3°, the conveying capability of the screen was significantly improved, while the penetrating capability of particles on both screen decks was slightly reduced. By taking the penetrating capability of particles and the conveying capability of the screen into comprehensive consideration, it turned out that better sizing effect would be achieved at the inclination angle of 3o. Our research will provide a reference for optimizing the processing parameters during the vibrating separation of buckwheat.

Fruit branch pruning is still done manually, resulting in high labor costs, ergonomic hazards, and low efficiency and productivity. Furthermore, there are some limitations with imported agricultural machines because of their high prices and inappropriate local conditions. Hence, the present study aims to manufacture a local device for fruit branch pruning based on validating the correct stem-cutting position using a branch guide. The manufactured device comprises a 60 W electric motor, a formed base, a teethed pruning disc, a telescopic tube made up of the picker-cutting mechanism of the device, and a 12–Volt rechargeable dry battery. The device was made from local and light materials to allow a telescopic tube to reach the high position of the citrus fruit branches and consider ergonomic aspects. Field trials were executed on sour oranges trees to assess the pruning device’s performance as a function of change in cutting disc speeds (9.81, 13.74, 17.66, and 21.59 m/s), cutting disc teeth numbers (60, 80, and 100 teeth), different groups of branches diameters {A (from 5 mm to less than 10 mm), B (10 mm to less than 20 mm), C (from 20 mm to less than 30 mm) and D (from 30 mm to less than 40 mm)}. The manufactured device was assessed in terms of device productivity, pruning efficiency, pruning damage, power requirements, specific energy, and operating cost. The results indicated that the highest device productivity and pruning efficiency were 780, 218, 100 and 65 branch/h; and 96.0, 94.0, 92.0 and 90.5%, while the lowest pruning branch damage were 4.0, 6.0, 8.0 and 9.5%, specific energy were 0.0447, 0.1645, 0.4050 and 0.700 Wh per branch, for the groups of branches diameters A, B, C, and D respectively. The current investigation recommended that the optimal operational conditions were using the manufactured device for pruning citrus trees at 17.66 m/s pruning disc speed with a pruning disc teeth number of 60 teeth.

The main task was to receive a robust transfer function for the capacitive grain moisture measurement system. It was estimated how the new transfer function compensates for the type uncertainty and how close it is to the nominal values of moisture content. Dispersions of adequacy and repeatability of the new transfer function, which describe possible variation in the measured moisture values and the correspondence of the new transfer function with the nominal linear transfer function of a moisture meter respectively, were calculated for five chosen substances. It was proved that the new transfer function has lower sensitivity to grain type and better adequacy to the ideal transfer function than the closest analog.

For the problem of lacking reliable parameters during simulation analysis of the crushed corn stalk (CCS) micro-comminution process with gas-solid coupling method, the simulation parameters are calibrated using a combination of physical measurements and virtual experiments with CCS as the research object. The intrinsic parameters of CCS are obtained by physical experiment, and the stacking test is carried out by cylinder lifting method, and the actual angle of repose(AoR) is obtained as 44.12° by fitting the boundary line with Matlab software; the discrete element model of CCS is established, and the virtual stacking test is carried out by EDEM software; CCS-CCS dynamic friction coefficient, CCS-CCS static friction coefficient and JKR (Johnson-Kendall-Roberts) surface energy are identified as the parameters with significant effects on the AoR by Plackett-Burman test; the steepest climb test is leveraged to determine the center of response surface analysis; the quadratic polynomial regression model of the simulation parameters and the AoR is established by the Box-Behnken test using the AoR as the evaluation index, and the optimal combination of the significant parameters are obtained as follows: the CCS-CCS dynamic friction coefficient is 0.55, the CCS-CCS static friction coefficient is 0.14, and the JKR surface energy is 0.12; the AoR verification test is conducted based on the optimal combination of the significant parameters The results show that the AoR of the CCS is 43.82°, which is 0.68% of the actual AoR, indicating that the parameter combination is reliable. The data obtained in this research can provide corresponding simulation parameters for CCS discrete element simulation and the development of straw micro-crushing equipment.

Because hydroponic plant nutrient is dissolved in the water, water quality management is essential for growing healthy plants. Taking care of the total dissolved solids (TDS) and the pH (water acidity) is essential. The purpose of this research is to create a IoT-based water quality monitoring device. The average TDS after 30 days of automation with an Arduino UNO was 1162.82 ppm, and the gadget kicked on the nutrient pump whenever the TDS fell below 1000 ppm or the EC fell below 2. The mechanism self-adjusts the pH when it falls below 5.5 or rises above 6.5, with a mean of 6.17.

Both in the case of precision agriculture and in the case of some agricultural works, in which the technological process is dependent on the velocity of displacement of the platform carrying the agricultural equipment, it is necessary to precisely adjust or even continuously adjust the velocity of displacement. This article presents the capabilities of continuously regulating the travel velocity of an agricultural platform equipped with a hydrostatic transmission and a PID controller with feedback, feedforward, as well as nonlinear disturbance compensation capabilities; such a platform can be fitted with various agricultural equipment.

Smart agriculture, which combines the Internet of Things (IoT) with agriculture, is the future of agricultural development. In China, manual irrigation is currently the dominant method for seedling irrigation management, but it is inefficient and can lead to water waste. To improve seedling quality and output, reduce labor costs, and conserve water resources, this paper presents a design for an IoT system that uses soil moisture detection and remote precision irrigation for seedlings. The system includes a STC12C5A60S2 microcontroller, an ESP8266-01S communication module, a PRISON PR-3000-ECTH-N01 soil temperature and humidity module, and a 12V water pump. The system is connected to the OneNET platform via the MQTT protocol of the Wi-Fi module and includes software modules for data processing, Wi-Fi communication, and relay control. The OneNET platform allows users to monitor and record real-time temperature and humidity data and switch between automatic and manual modes and seedling threshold types. The system was tested for 24 hours and collected 28,000 temperature and humidity data points every 3 seconds with a packet loss rate of less than 5%. The results show that the system is stable and reliable.

Dry direct seeding cultivation technology of rice is an important aspect of rice production and management. Six treatments were designed in this paper, and that is, T1 (conventional irrigation), T2 (conventional irrigation + conditioner), T3 (30% water-saving irrigation), T4 (30% water-saving irrigation + conditioner), T5 (50% water-saving irrigation), T6 (50% water-saving irrigation + conditioner). The results showed that in the three separate irrigation treatments, 30% water-saving irrigation was conducive to the growth of dry direct seeding rice at the tillering stage, jointing and booting stage, and 50% water-saving irrigation was more conducive to the growth of rice at grain filling stage. Compared with no application of amendments, all kinds of treatments could significantly promote the growth of dry direct seeding rice. Under the condition of water-saving irrigation of 30%, higher dry matter quality, yield and nutrient absorption can be obtained. The total dry matter quality and rice yield of T4 treatment with 30% water-saving irrigation and conditioner were the highest, which were 99.90 g/pot and 37.76 g/pot respectively, compared with conventional treatment (T1) was 37.60% and 45.96% higher, and this treatment had obvious effect on nitrogen and potassium absorption. In terms of quality impact, water saving was 30% Irrigation conditions are conducive to the improvement of rice processing quality, appearance quality and nutritional quality, especially after the application of conditioner, the overall rice quality is improved. This study has a certain reference value for water-saving irrigation, promoting nutrient utilization, stable yield and high quality of dry direct seeding rice.

In order to solve the problem of high broken rate and impurity rate in the direct harvesting of corn kernels in China, a flexible threshing element with variable stiffness consisting of a conical spring and rasp bar was developed on the basis of the existing horizontal axial-flow flow corn threshing cylinder structure to achieve low loss harvesting of corn kernels. Through mechanical analysis of the key components of the threshing element, its structure and operating parameters were determined. Then, orthogonal tests were carried out using the feed amount, threshing clearance and cylinder speed as the test factors, and the broken rate and impurity rate of the corn kernels as the test indicators. The results showed that the feed amount, threshing clearance and cylinder speed had a significant effect on the broken rate and impurity rate of corn kernels; the optimum parameters for the corn variable stiffness flexible threshing device were feed amount 6.1 kg•s-1, threshing clearance 40 mm and cylinder speed 392 r•min-1. The broken rate of corn kernels was 1.67% and impurity rate 1.03%. The test results fully met the requirements of the national standards for corn harvesting operations. This study provides a technical basis for the application of the axial flow corn flexible threshing device in the corn direct harvesting combine.

In order to reduce the harvest loss and optimize and improve the comprehensive performance of the combine harvester, the relationship between the feeding quantity, drum torque, drum speed, harvest loss, and other factors of the wheat combine harvester is studied, and the functional relationship between the loss, feeding quantity and speed is determined. According to the test data, the relationship model between the feeding quantity of the harvester and the drum torque is a quadratic function. For the land with uniform growth, the size of feeding quantity is mainly affected by the forward speed of the harvester. In this way, this paper indirectly achieves the purpose of controlling the feeding quantity by controlling the speed of the harvesting machinery. The control system designed in this paper uses the compensated fuzzy PID to control the walking speed of the vehicle through real-time detection of the drum torque, drum speed and loss of the harvester, so as to comprehensively control the working speed of the harvester and effectively control the harvest loss. The test results show that the control system can effectively reduce the harvest loss and improve the harvest efficiency compared with the manual harvest of the wheat.

Water scarcity has been a critical constraint to economic development in semi-arid areas of China, so optimizing irrigation scheduling has become essential. This study obtained quantitative relationships between crop yield, crop water consumption, and irrigation quantity based on the Hydrus-2D and Stewart models. Different irrigation scheduling scenarios were evaluated to obtain the best irrigation scheduling based on the principle of simultaneous water conservation and crop productivity improvement with the evaluation indicators of crop yield, water use efficiency (WUE), irrigation water use efficiency (IWUE), and Critic-Topsis method. Taking drip irrigation under mulch as an example, the problem of optimizing the irrigation scheduling for different typical years was calculated. The optimization results showed that in the wet, normal, dry, and very dry years the annual irrigation quantity should be 49.68 mm, 49.68 mm, 85.38 mm, and 123.72 mm, when the WUE as well as IWUE, increases significantly, which had less impact on the crop yield and can save irrigation quantity by 30.00%, 30.00%, 35.00%, 27.00%. This study used Hydrus-2D to make a new attempt in irrigation scheduling optimization, giving full play to the models high accuracy in soil water transport simulation and flexibility in boundary condition simulation. The optimization results can provide a reference for achieving accurate control of irrigation quantity during the crop growth period and reasonable irrigation scheduling formulation for regional crops.

Identification and classification of vegetation are the basis for grassland degradation monitoring, classification and quantification studies. Here, four deep learning models were used to classify the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) hyperspectral remote sensing images of desert grassland. VGG16 and ResNet18 achieved better image classification results for vegetation and bare soil, whereas three-dimensional (3D)-VGG16 and 3D-ResNet18, improved by 3D convolutional kernels, achieved better classification for vegetation, bare soil and small sample features in the images. The number of convolutional kernels, its size and batch size parameters of each model were optimised, and 3D-ResNet18-J had the best classification performance, with an overall classification accuracy of 97.74%. It achieved high precision and efficiency in classifying UAV hyperspectral remote sensing images of desert grassland.

This paper presents the results obtained by INMA Bucharest, following a research project, in which a technology for harvesting and storing industrial hemp was developed. The equipment for harvesting green hemp stalks intended for this technology was tested in an experimental plot grown with Dacia - Secuieni hemp. Operating indices (actual torque at the power take-off, traction force at drawbar, total effective power to operate the equipment, working speed, effective working capacity) and working qualitative indices (stalk cutting height at lower knife and upper knife, degree of stalk cutting, stalk diameter, the average length of the stalk cut without inflorescence). As a result of the analysis of the values obtained for the operating indices and qualitative working indices, a series of pertinent conclusions and observations resulted, which will help guide harvesting and storage practices to ensure quality requirements for hemp fibre production are met.

The spring finger collection mechanism is a core component of balers. It is usually used to collect soft straw crops (corn straw, wheat straw, green forage), and rarely used for hard stem crops (such as branch pruning residues). Due to different biophysical characteristics of hard stem crops and soft straw crops, the collection mechanisms are also different. In China, branch pruning residues in apple orchards are collected manually. It is a heavy labor task. To this end, this article uses an improved spring finger mechanism to collect pruning residues in apple orchard branches, effectively replacing manual collection operations. A dynamic motion trajectory simulation platform is developed by analyzing each action using pitchforks or other agricultural tools throughout the entire collection process, and combined with the structure of the spring finger collection mechanism. The platform of the spring finger collection mechanism is improved to collect orchard branches, and redesign and manufacture the core components of the collection mechanism. In addition, comparative tests were performed on4 different placement orientation sunder the conditions of R=40±2 r/min and V=0.9-1.1 m/s. That is, 1) messy, 2) transverse, 3) portrait orientation (the treetop firstly contacts the collection device), and 4) portrait orientation (the thick stems of the branches first touch the collection device). The results indicate that 1) and 2) have similar success rates in picking branches, while 3) and 4) have lower success rates, especially with 4) being the lowest). The analysis found that some branches were directly inserted into the spring finger gap and moved under the machine, resulting in a large amount of losses. This study aims to improve the success rate of picking branches in the bundling machine and verify the relationship between different placement directions and the success rate of picking branches.

To better analyze the distribution law of airflow in the wind sieve type cleaning device, this study took the cleaning device of Yafeng 4YZL-6S corn seed harvester as an example and conducted numerical simulation and comparative analysis of the airflow field inside the cleaning device under the sieve plate opening scales of 12, 16 and 20 mm using CFD software. The numerical simulation showed that the distribution of airflow velocity above the sieve surface was uniform at a sieve plate opening scale of 16 mm. Airflow velocity measurements were performed on the test prototype using an anemometer to verify the accuracy of the numerical simulation results. The simulation test results were supplemented by field trials, which showed that when the speed of the cleaning fan was 1200 r/min and the sieve plate opening scale was 16 mm, the impurity rate in the field harvest of the operating machinery was 1.03% and the loss rate was 1.91%. The operating effect met the standard of mechanized corn grain harvesting. This paper can provide a reference for the design and working mechanism research of corn seed harvester cleaning devices.

In response to the seasonal surge in the number of agricultural machinery failures in the service area caused by cross regional operations of agricultural machinery, agricultural machinery and equipment manufacturing enterprises have established emergency service networks to compensate for the insufficient service capacity of service providers. This paper proposes a method for locating and allocating emergency service vehicles based on a set coverage model, which aims to minimize the total cost of vehicle scheduling schemes and comprehensively consider the service scope and service capabilities of emergency service vehicles. An improved genetic algorithm is designed to solve the emergency service vehicle configuration problem, determine the scheduling location and number of emergency service vehicles, and verify its effectiveness through practical cases. Provide effective guarantee for agricultural machinery maintenance services for agricultural machinery enterprises in the cluster operation process, and improve the efficiency of maintenance services.

The mechanical parameters of Cerasus humilis are the basic data for subsequent studies on fruit deformation, damage, and movement characteristics during harvesting and transportation, but these parameters are rarely reported. Relevant mechanical parameters of whole fruit compression are calculated by comparing physical tests and virtual simulations. The orthogonal rotating combined experimental design was used to arrange the simulation tests, with the elastic modulus (E), yield limit (Ey), and tangent modulus (Et) as the influence factors and compression force as the result. Response surface optimization was employed to find the closest test point to the force–deformation curve of the physical test. The parameters of the pulp test point are as follows: E = 0.923 MPa, Ey = 0.0897 MPa, and Et = 0.478 MPa. Results show that the step on the force–deformation curve was not the beginning of the pulp yield, which was substantially earlier than the strain rate at the simulation step. The region of increased stress in the pulp first appeared at the junction with the core due to stress concentration. Combining virtual and physical tests to solve the mechanical parameters of fruits is more suitable than testing the standard pulp sample.

In response to the seasonal surge in the number of agricultural machinery failures in the service area caused by cross regional operations of agricultural machinery, agricultural machinery and equipment manufacturing enterprises have established emergency service networks to compensate for the insufficient service capacity of service providers. This paper proposes a method for locating and allocating emergency service vehicles based on a set coverage model, which aims to minimize the total cost of vehicle scheduling schemes and comprehensively consider the service scope and service capabilities of emergency service vehicles. An improved genetic algorithm is designed to solve the emergency service vehicle configuration problem, determine the scheduling location and number of emergency service vehicles, and verify its effectiveness through practical cases. Provide effective guarantee for agricultural machinery maintenance services for agricultural machinery enterprises in the cluster operation process, and improve the efficiency of maintenance services.

In order to explore the conveying mechanism of kneaded corn stalk in the screw conveyor and improve the conveying performance of the screw conveyor, the study of the screw conveying process of kneaded corn stalk was carried out, and the simulation model of the screw conveying process of kneaded corn stalk was established by using the discrete element method. The results showed that: The pitch, feed amount and screw shaft speed have significant effects on the productivity and power of screw conveying, and there are significant interactions. The optimal parameters of the multi-factor simulation optimization test were 319.428mm pitch, feed amount of 71.062kg/min, screwshaft speed of 117.034r/min, corresponding productivity of 71.517kg/min and power of 769.84W. This study reveals the screw conveying mechanism of kneaded corn stover, verifies the feasibility of using discrete element simulation to analyze the conveying process of kneaded corn stover, and provides a theoretical basis for improving and optimizing the screw conveying device.

Flaxseed oil is rich in a-linolenic acid and other nutrients, and the adulteration happens frequently because of its high price. To detect the adulteration of flaxseed oil quickly and accurately, a method was proposed based on weighted reconstructed two-dimensional correlation near-infrared(NIR) spectra. The near-infrared spectra of 79 adulterated flaxseed oil samples (adulterated by rapeseed oil with the doping volume ratio 1%-40%) were measured, and the traditional two-dimensional correlation synchronous spectra were calculated. The two-dimensional correlation synchronous spectra of all samples were decomposed into multiple components of different scales by the bi-dimensional empirical mode decomposition algorithm (BEMD). According to the root mean square error(RMSE) values of the adulteration detection sub-models established by each component, the weights of the corresponding components were calculated, and then the two-dimensional correlation spectra of all samples were reconstructed by accumulating the weighted components. A quantitative analysis model of flaxseed oil adulteration was established based on the weighted reconstructed two-dimensional correlation spectra combined with the N-way partial least square(N-PLS)algorithm. Compared with the traditional two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy, the model built by the weighted reconstructed two-dimensional correlation spectra had better performance with the calibration determination coefficient increased by 6.05%, and the prediction determination coefficient increased by 7.5%. The proposed method could effectively enhance the spectral feature information, reduce the spectral noise interference, and hence provide a new idea for the detection of edible oil adulteration.

Conical wind field anti-drift spray is an innovative form of anti-drift operation using auxiliary air flow, which can resist the generation of vortex, and has the characteristics of reducing the droplets loss with wind at the vertical height. In order to explore the characteristics of spray flow field and droplet deposition performance under conical wind field, the structure and working principle were analyzed based on the basic principle of proton dynamics. Spraytec and PDPA system were used to explore the distribution characteristics of spray flow field. Box-Behnken experimental design was used to analyze the droplet deposition performance. The optimum combination of the working parameters with spray height is 0.46 m, the spray pressure was 0.34 MPa, the conical wind speed was 16.16 m/s, and the droplet deposition amount was 3.39µL·cm-2. The droplet deposition amount was optimal.

The development of an electric vehicle harvester for aquatic vegetation is a technical challenge for researchers due to specific requirements: high-torque operation at low travel speeds, high maneuverability, high load capacity, low draught, and affordable price. The collective of authors proposed an electro-hydraulic architecture based on paddles driven by hydraulic motors for propulsion and auxiliary services also driven by motors and hydraulic actuators. The proposed energy source for the aquatic harvester is electric batteries, it was developed a system of 33 kWh Li-Ion batteries connected in parallel, which power an electronic converter and a 14.5 kW rated power electric motor that drives a hydraulic double-circuit pump. The vehicle can be controlled remotely. The paper presents the prototype made and the results obtained during laboratory tests performed for the electric powering system.

The objective of ecological restoration and rehabilitation of grasslands is to recreate the original appearance of damaged or degraded vegetation. From previous research, the pneumatic spraying technology is now more commonly used in the world for vegetation restoration. Pneumatic spraying is relatively inexpensive and causes little damage to the original vegetation, making it one of the most effective techniques for restoring natural grassland vegetation under natural climatic conditions. In this paper, the effect of the spraying machine pipe working airflow on the quality of spraying was studied through simulation analysis and experimental tests. The seeding area of the spraying machine corresponding to different values of the pipe inlet airflow speed was determined. The conclusions show that: 1) the spray pipe inlet airflow velocity has a great influence on the uniformity of spraying. When the airflow velocity is higher than 55 m/s, the spraying is not uniform, while the airflow velocity is lower than 45 m/s, the spraying amplitude is smaller, the operational efficiency is low, which is not conducive to the restoration of degraded grasslands; 2) considering the uniformity of spraying and operational efficiency, the airflow velocity at the inlet of the spray pipe should be between 45 and 55 m/s when the spraying machine is in operation. The seed drop area is changed, by adjusting the airflow velocity of the spray pipe inlet, and the reseeding and leakage area of the seed drop area is reduced, so that the spraying performance of the spraying machine is optimized.

As one of the ancient cultivated crops in China, millet has the characteristics of high nutritional value, drought resistance and barrenness. It also plays an important role in ensuring the supply of food in our country. At present, most of the millet breeding work uses manual extraction of phenotypic information, which is labor-intensive and inefficient. Therefore, the development of an automated, efficient and accurate millet phenotype detection method has practical significance for the extraction of the millet genome. In this study, a combination of sparse reconstruction based on Structure from Motion (SfM) and Patch-based Multi-View Stereo (PMVS) was used to select three different varieties of millet. A total of 81 samples of 9 samples in each period were reconstructed to obtain a 3D model of millet. The combination of conditional filtering and statistical filtering is used to remove the noise points generated during the photographing process, and finally the obtained point cloud data is used to measure the agronomic traits of millet such as plant height and leaf area. The results show that the interval angle of 5° is the best reconstruction angle of millet. The coefficient of determination R2 of point cloud measurement results and manual measurement data regression analysis is higher than 0.94, indicating that the method used for 3D reconstruction has high applicability to different millet in different periods and high-throughput measurement of millet by the method in this paper is feasible. This study provides a theoretical basis for a millet phenotypic information measurement device.

It is urgent to study the damage mechanism of corn kernels and find ways of reducing the rate of kernel breakage in mechanical threshing. This paper, by studying the mechanical curves and deformation characteristics of corn kernels with different moisture contents, points out the brittle mechanical characteristics of corn kernel damage fracture with low moisture content, and clarifies the the variation law of mechanical properties of kernels with moisture contents. The experimental data of fatigue load - fatigue life curves of corn kernels with different moisture contents were described by the power function equation. At the same time, the fatigue life and damage characteristics of kernel with different moisture content were analyzed, and the accuracy of the fitting equation was verified. Through mathematical statistical analysis, the normal distribution curve of fatigue life was fitted, and the variation law of normal distribution curve with moisture content and fatigue load was determined.

In this paper the evaporator from the air handling units (AHU) is being studied, this being connected to an air conditioning installation with mechanical compression of vapors, existing within the Thermodynamics department. In a previous analysis, the heat exchanger (HEX) was checked to see if it complied with the cooling capacity relative to the heat exchange surface by finding the specific criteria equations. A follow-up to the previous article is to calculate based on the thermodynamic cycle, what happens if the refrigerant is replaced with other new refrigerants in the field of air conditioning in order to improve the performance of the air conditioning system (ACS), finding the refrigerant with a low Global warming potential (GWP) and with an appropriate flammability class. The moisture content of seeds is one of the most important storage parameters affecting their quality. In order to obtain the desired effect, the temperature and humidity of the air must be maintained in the warehouse with an air treatment unit. In this study, it is desired to replace the refrigerant and preserve the refrigerating power from the evaporator, by changing the degree of sub-cooling from the condenser. Due to the fact that the temperature in the ambient environment changes substantially during a calendar year and the condenser of the air conditioning installation has the same configuration, thus the decrease in the ambient temperature will result in the appearance of the sub-cooling process and an increase in the performance of the installation.

To accurately simulate the interactions between the plug seedlings and the planter during the planting process and explore the damage mechanism of the plug seedling substrate block, the bonding parameters of plug seedlings substrate block were calibrated by the discrete element method. The physical puncture test showed that the average of maximum force of the cone indenter on substrate block measured by texture analyzer was 4.633 N. A Hertz-Mindlin with the bonding model was established for the substrate block in EDEM software. A virtual calibration experiment was designed with the puncture force of substrate block as the evaluation index. The two-level factorial test and the steepest climbing test were used to screen out the significant parameters and the optimal interval. Then, the Box-Behnken test and the optimization solution were used to obtain the optimal bonding parameter combination of the substrate block particles. Finally, the optimal parameter combination was simulated and verified. The relative error of the maximum puncture force between the simulated value and the measured value was 1.88 %, which indicated that the bonding parameters of the substrate block obtained by calibration were accurate and reliable.

Currently, maize production in China suffers from many problems, such as excessive fertilizer application, inefficient fertilizer use, and insufficient agricultural labour. The effect of one-time mechanical point-applied fertilization of controlled-release compound fertilizer in the root-zone on yield and nutrient uptake was investigated to explore efficient fertilization patterns for fertilizer decrease and yield increase in maize. The selected fertilizer was a controlled-release granular fertilizer (24-6-10 for N-P2O5-K2O) with six treatments in the application program: 1) no fertilizer (CK); 2) application of a one-time banding fertilizer (BDP) 5 cm off the seeds between rows and 10 cm deep; 3) application of a one-time point-applied fertilization (RZF) 5 cm off seed in the row and 10 cm deep; 4) application of a one-time point-applied fertilization (90% RZF) 10% fertilizer reduction 5 cm off seed in the row and 10 cm deep; 5) application of a one-time point-applied fertilization (80% RZF) 20% fertilizer reduction 5 cm off seed in the row and 10 cm deep; 6) application of a one-time point-applied fertilization (70% RZF) 30% fertilizer reduction 5 cm off seed in the row and 10 cm deep. The results showed that RZF increased yield by 5.84% over BDP, and the difference was significant, indicating that mechanized point-applied fertilization of fertilizer can replace manual point-applied fertilization application operations and achieve increased crop yield. The agronomic utilization rate of fertilizer of 12.35% and the bias productivity of 5.31% were higher in RZF than in BDP, and the differences were significant, indicating that one-time mechanical point-applied fertilization in the root zone significantly improved fertilizer utilization and reduced fertilizer loss.

This paper proposed a technical idea of joint operation of conveying and grading and developed a potato conveying and grading device with variable space to realize efficient grading in the field because of the difficulties of field grading in the process of potato harvesting in the hilly mountains of northwest China. Based on field measurement of potato size distribution, the clearance between rotating plates of potato conveying and grading device was determined. The key structural parameters of the rotating plate were obtained by referring to the structure and relevant parameters of the conveying and grading device. Moreover, the conveyor chain elevation angle of the conveying and grading device was determined through the dynamics analysis of potatoes on the conveying and grading device. The inclined plane test determined the inclination angle of the potato guide plate. To reduce the damage to potatoes in the process of conveying and grading, damage analysis was carried out. Finally, Field tests were conducted with conveyor chain elevation angle, unit forward speed, and the conveyor chain line speed as test factors, and the grading accuracy and the damage rate of the potato conveying and grading device as test indexes. The test results showed that when the conveyor chain elevation angle, unit forward speed, and conveyor chain line speed were 21.0°, 0.8 m/s, and 1.3 m/s, respectively, the grading accuracy was 91.4% and the rate of potato damage was 0.88%. The operational performance of the prototype was stable, and all the test evaluation indicators could meet the agronomic requirements of the potato harvester.

To carry out simulation research on tire-soil interaction, EDEM software was used to calibrate the test soil and the contact parameters between the tire and soil. The soil contact model was the Edinburgh Elasto-Plastic Adhesion (EEPA) model. Using the soil repose angle as the repose value, the contact plasticity ratio, the soil-soil rolling friction coefficient, and the tensile exponential (Tensile exp) were respectively calculated using the Plackett-Burman test, the steepest climbing test, and the Box-Behnken test, and the optimal combination of parameters was found to be E = 0.08, B = 0.1, and F = 4.8. The values of the remaining parameters were as follows: a soil-soil static friction coefficient of 0.45, a restitution coefficient of 0.5, a surface energy of 4, and a tangential stiffness multiplier of 0.35. Based on the slope sliding method, the coefficient of static friction between soil and rubber was calculated as 0.88. On this basis, a central combination test was designed to calibrate the rubber-soil rolling friction coefficient and coefficient of restitution, the optimal combination of which was found to be H = 0.18 and I = 0.55. A soil tank model was created using the optimal parameters, and the correctness of the established soil discrete element model and rubber-soil contact parameters was validated by comparing the simulation results and the results of an experiment of the tire driving process.

For the problem of lacking reliable parameters during simulation analysis of the crushed corn stalk (CCS) micro-comminution process with gas-solid coupling method, the simulation parameters are calibrated using a combination of physical measurements and virtual experiments with CCS as the research object. The intrinsic parameters of CCS are obtained by physical experiment, and the stacking test is carried out by cylinder lifting method, and the actual angle of repose(AoR) is obtained as 44.12° by fitting the boundary line with Matlab software; the discrete element model of CCS is established, and the virtual stacking test is carried out by EDEM software; CCS-CCS dynamic friction coefficient, CCS-CCS static friction coefficient and JKR (JohnsonKendall-Roberts) surface energy are identified as the parameters with significant effects on the AoR by Plackett-Burman test; the steepest climb test is leveraged to determine the center of response surface analysis; the quadratic polynomial regression model of the simulation parameters and the AoR is established by the Box-Behnken test using the AoR as the evaluation index, and the optimal combination of the significant parameters are obtained as follows: the CCS-CCS dynamic friction coefficient is 0.14, the CCS-CCS static friction coefficient is 0.55, and the JKR surface energy is 0.12; the AoR verification test is conducted based on the optimal combination of the significant parameters. The results show that the AoR of the CCS is 43.82°, which is 0.68% of the actual AoR, indicating that the parameter combination is reliable. The data obtained in this research can provide corresponding simulation parameters for CCS discrete element simulation and the development of straw micro-crushing equipment.

The paper presents the results of research on film biocomposites made of thermoplastic starch (TPS) and various types of nut shells. The research involved the use of thermally treated nut shells: hazelnuts, pistachios, walnuts and peanuts. TPS biocomposites were produced by the pour method using non-adherent moulds. The obtained samples were used to test the basic physical properties used in testing biodegradable materials. The following parameters were determined: mechanical strength, colour and colour difference, water contact angle, moisture absorption from water and atmospheric air. Images of biocomposite fractures were also taken using a scanning electron microscope (SEM). It was found that the addition of nut shells enabled the production of homogeneous materials and contributed to the improvement of their strength parameters. The research showed that nut shells can be a prospective raw material for the production of innovative biodegradable materials.