Tag: drainage pot

The type of plant has also been shown to influence the rate of bacterial pathogen internalization

In previous studies in hydroponically growing Romaine lettuce, it was shown that the levels of internalized TV RNA was higher than the levels of infectious virus that could be recovered from the same samples . In addition it was found that employing an RNAse pre-treatment to degrade viral RNA that was not found in an intact viral capsid reduced the level of TV RNA detection . Similarly, in studies investigating murine norovirus and hepatitis A virus internalization in green onions and spinach more samples were found to be positive for viral RNA compared to infectious virus . Two types of growth substrates, soil and hydroponic solution are commonly used in pathogen internalization studies conducted with plants. Pathogen internalization has been detected more often in hydroponically grown plants compared to plants grown in soil . In this study, both hydroponic and soil growing green onions were contaminated with TV at a level of 1 × 106 PFU/ml. Similar to previous studies, we found that internalization of TV via the root of hydroponically growing green onion occurred while no TV internalization occurred in soil grown green onions. The same phenomena was also observed with HAV and MNV, which were not detected in green onion plants grown in soil for up to 20 days . Compared to soil systems,black plastic plant pots a drastic increase in virus internalization was observed in hydroponic systems with both HAV and MNV internalized up to 4 log RT-qPCR units . Most investigators have suggested that the motility in hydroponic solution may provide more opportunity for uptake and internalization into leafy green plants compared to soil systems .

The virus capsid has an ionic charge and it may remain bound to charged particles in the soil matrix reducing viral uptake by the roots . It is also possible that root damage induced by transplanting of seedlings into the hydroponic system also increased internalization in this study and others . In this study, no virus internalization occurred in radishes while there was viral internalization detected in green onions and Romaine lettuce. Internalization of Salmonella Typhimurium was also observed in lettuce and radish but not cress or spinach seedlings . In the same study, radish seedlings were susceptible to Salmonella internalization while mature radishes were resistant, indicating the importance of plant age on pathogen internalization and dissemination . The radishes used in this study were mature . In our study we found no significant decrease in the level of virus detected in the feed water of hydroponically growing radishes. This indicates that no viral uptake occurred via radish root and it is possible that these mature radishes were not permissive to pathogen internalization. Previously it was shown TV was internalized and disseminated in growing strawberry plants while the virus was not detected in peppers of growing green pepper plants . It was found that the green peppers had a significant anti-viral effect on TV and that this may play a role in the lack of internalization in bell pepper plants . In this study, we found that the levels of TV detected in Romaine lettuce increased over the study period, which is indicative of internalization and dissemination with no inhibition. However, the internalization and dissemination kinetics was different in green onions with high levels of internalized virus detected on day 1 post inoculation and decreasing over the study period. This may indicate that an inhibitory compound in the green onion may be inactivating the virus.

Green onions contain a wide array of phenolic compounds which have the potential to act as antimicrobials . We found that sap from the green onion root lead to a 1-log reduction in infectious TV only after 14 days of exposure. Previously, it was found that a component of radishes, trans-4–methylthio-3-butenyl isothiocyanate , possessed antimicrobial activity . In addition, the pigment found in the skin of radishes, anthocyanins, have also been shown to have antiviral activity. Different cyanidin glycosides present in radishes have antiviral activity against influenza A and B viruses and herpes-1 virus . Our data indicates that radish roots are not permissive to virus penetration and internalization; therefore, we investigated whether radishes had antiviral properties. A maximum 1-log reduction in infectious TV titer was achieved after 14 days of exposure of TV to radish sap, indicating only minimal antiviral effects. In conclusion, we have shown that i) human NoV and TV can be internalized in hydroponically grown green onions but not in soil grown green onions, ii) the magnitude of TV internalization is influenced by the level of virus present, and iii) different types of plants have different susceptibility for viral internalization. Salinity stress is a major abiotic stress that has significant adverse effects on crop productivity and yield. These negative effects include interference of root function in absorbing water, as well as the prevention of physiological and biochemical processes such as nutrient uptake and assimilation . Unfortunately, many regions around the world are facing a rapid increase in soil salinity and sodicity. It is estimated that at least 0.3 million hectares of farmland is becoming unusable annually, and another 20–46 million ha are suffering decreases in production potential each year . Nevertheless, even with lower yield potential, these salt-affected farmlands must continue to produce crops so the increasing demand for food can be met and food security concerns mitigated.

The lack of new productive land threatens food security, thus the productivity of existing marginal lands must improve.There are numerous potential solutions for mitigating salt stress, including genetic engineering of plants with salt tolerance and application of exogenous compounds such as hormones, growth regulators, or nanoparticles . Among the potential solutions, selecting plant varieties with high tolerance to salt stress appears to be one of the most promising approaches in utilizing salt-affected soil for crop production . Although some progress has been made using measurement of photosynthetic parameters as a more sensitive method to screen for salt tolerance , the standard process of selecting either conventionally–bred or transgenic salt-tolerant crop lines relies on laborious phenotyping to assess tolerance. Despite the emergence of innovative platforms, precise instrumentation, sophisticated sensors, and rapid development of advanced machine learning and deep learning algorithms, phenotyping is still a barrier to variety development. While DNA sequencing and plant genotyping has rapidly evolved, phenotyping still depends on conventional methods which are not as accurate or efficient. In general, these techniques can be time-consuming, destructive, subjective, and costly. In recent years, non-contact sensing technology, in particular imaging, has been extensively deployed as a potential substitute for conventional methods for high-throughput phenotyping of plants. Thanks to the advances in developing sensors with high spatial and spectral resolution, different imaging sensors including visible, fluorescence, thermal, and spectral imaging are available, each tailored for specific applications. Each of these sensing technologies can vary in their application, as well as limitations, in the context of plant phenotyping . Among these techniques, hyperspectral imaging is uniquely suited to provide insights into the internal activities of plants, leaf tissue structure, leaf pigments, and water content . HSI also provides the ability to investigate physiological dynamics of plants caused by environmental variables , and consequently has drawn substantial attention for plant phenotyping . Few research studies have attempted to identify salt stress in plants using hyperspectral reflectance. In a previous study, three potential indicators including blue, yellow, and red edge positions of vegetation reflectance spectrum were calculated to detect four levels of salt stress imposed on Chinese castor bean . The authors claimed that blue and red edge positions shift to the shorter wavelength in response to salt stress and therefore could be used to detect salt stress. However, the pattern of shifting to the shorter wavelength was not consistent across all treatments and hence further research is required. In another paper,black plastic planting pots the application of HSI to identify plant tolerance to salt stress in a high throughput phenotyping system was reviewed . They concluded more efficient and fully automated methods are required to analyze complex hyperspectral images. To leverage the full potential of HSI, a large high-quality hyperspectral dataset and several preprocessing tasks are necessary .

However, there are two major challenges that hamper the application of HSI. The first major challenge is accounting for the variance caused by the complex interaction between incident light and leaf surfaces due to non-Lambertian reflectance properties. The direction of reflected light is a function of leaf geometry, including leaf angle, and curvature. Several researchers have focused on pre-processing techniques to address the problems related to leaf angle and curvature . One method to resolve this problem is to generate a high-resolution 3D representation of plants by upfront geometric calibration of the hyperspectral camera . However, this proposed method depends on highly intensive processing and is only suitable for close-range imaging. The second major challenge is analyzing the complex and high-dimensional hyperspectral images in order to extract meaningful features and recognize latent patterns associated with the desired phenotyping trait in a more interpretable manner. To address this issue, machine learning and deep learning algorithms can be leveraged. Recent reviews of various ML algorithms emphasize the potential of these methods in the context of agriculture and provide guidelines for plant scientists to deploy them . Singh et al. reported that ML algorithms are a promising approach to analyze large datasets generated by sophisticated imaging sensors mounted to platforms that can cover large areas. Despite several studies that focus on the application of HSI for plant phenotyping, research is limited in the context of handling, processing, and analyzing hyperspectral images. This research was motivated by the need to identify salt tolerant wheat lines to mitigate yield losses due to salinity, and to ultimately maintain or improve production on saline soils. The objectives of this study were to rank wheat lines based on their tolerance to salt stress, assess the difference between the salt tolerance of lines to attain a quantitative ranking rather than a qualitative ranking, and evaluate the feasibility of precise ranking of wheat lines as early as one day after applying salt treatment. We hypothesized that the spectral response of wheat leaves experiencing salt stress would deviate from the control leaves even one day after adding the stress, and this deviation would be larger for a susceptible line compared to a salt tolerant line. To the best of our knowledge, no previous study has investigated early detection of salt tolerant plant lines using advanced phenotyping tools and approaches. This research proposes a machine learning approach to analyze hyperspectral images of wheat lines to rank their salt stress tolerance in a quantitative, interpretable, and non-destructive manner while reducing cost, time, and labor input.To develop analytical methods for analysis of hyperspectral images, four bread wheat lines were selected with varying levels of salt tolerance. The cultivar Kharchia was included as it is historically known to maintain a stable harvest index and yield well in high salt conditions , and the salt-sensitive cultivar Chinese Spring was selected as well . Two additional “unknown” lines were selected for screening from a set of wheat alloplasmic lines developed in Japan . Alloplasmic lines are created by substitution backcrossing to replace the cytoplasmic genomes of one species with those of another while maintaining the original nuclear genome background, and have shown promise for improving stress tolerance and other developmental traits . The two alloplasmic lines selected were Aegilops columnaris KU11-2 [abbreviated co hereafter] and Ae. speltoides aucheri KU2201B [abbreviated sp hereafter] with the cytoplasmic genome type preceding the nuclear genome background, which in this case is Chinese Spring . Screening was performed in a hydroponic system in a Conviron growth chamber to ensure uniform conditions. Hydroponic systems are commonly used to screen plants for salt tolerance, including wheat. In all experiments, growth conditions in the Conviron were set at 22◦C during light conditions and 18◦C during the dark, 16 h photoperiod, 375 µmol m−2 s −1 light intensity, and 50% relative humidity. Three hydroponic tanks were used per treatment . Each hydroponic tank contained a grid of 16 Cone-tainers filled with perlite. Within each tank, there were four genotypes each with four individual replicates . For each treatment , there were three replicate tanks; hence, there were a total of 48 Cone-tainers for each treatment.

Animal intrusion into fresh produce fields causes significant agricultural losses each year

We present a novel approach that uses multiple linear regression to combine the CPU temperature from nearby SBCs and remote weather stations, to estimate the temperature at outdoor locations that do not have temperature sensors. We use sensor data to train and test multiple regres-sion models. We investigate the efficacy of using different smoothing techniques and we account for the computational load of SBCs at the time of measurement and data collection. We find that our approach enables a prediction error that is less than 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit, while past work results in errors of 1–14 degrees Fahrenheit for similar datasets. We integrate sensor synthesis into Hypatia and use it to facilitate automatic and scalable model selection, as well as visualization for different data sets and recommendations. Finally, we developed a new approach to distributed scheduling for analytics applications in IoT settings: sensor-edge-cloud deployments. Our scheduler takes advantage of remote resources when available, while fully utilizing local edge systems, as it optimizes for time to completion for applications and workloads. The scheduler uses remote resources only if doing so reduces the latency of providing actionable insights locally. The scheduler uses histories of both computation and communication time the applications, which it uses to construct a job placement schedule that minimizes application response latency . Hypatia then uses this schedule to automatically deploy workloads across edge systems and cloud computing systems. We empirically evaluate Hypatia using both clustering and regression services and show that it is able to achieve better end-to-end performance than using the edge or cloud alone. The result is the first end-to-end system that fully utilizes edge computing resources as it serves the needs of precision agriculture.

It does so by accounting for resource constraints at the edge, the lack of or intermittent connectivity to the public cloud,pots with drainage holes and the expense of transmitting the data to/from remote cloud systems. Moreover, the system is open-source and integrates a wide range of analytics, scoring methods, and visualization tools, which can be easily extended with new and emerging techniques. By doing so, we enable others to easily build upon, extend, reproduce, and compare it to our work in the future. Moving forward, we hope to encourage adoption of Hypatia by growers, farm consultants, and data analysts interested in taking advantage of the locality of edge systems to provide low latency analytics. Given the existing infrastructure, we plan to add new sensors, develop more synthesized, sensors, and to integrate additional analytics and scoring methods. Specifically, we plan to extend Hypatia with support for image classification and to use analytics accelerators at both the edge and in the cloud when available. Other future work includes investigating new data sources and machine learning algorithms that inform a more refined scheduling algorithm that can take advantage of even more granular resources. In addition, Hypatia error analysis can benefit from additional abstractions that account error propagation, which has the potential for making the results and recommendation more informative and trustworthy.Fragmentation of natural habitats during conversion of wild lands to agriculture and the subsequent increase in agrochemicals has resulted in a loss of biodiversity and a deterioration of ecosystem function, including natural pest control. Non-crop habitats harbor natural enemies to crop pests . Such habitats also harbor beneficial songbirds that consume insect pests , and provide perching sites for raptors that deter avian and rodent pests . Balancing the role of agricultural lands in providing habitat for biodiversity while simultaneously avoiding bird damage and reducing food safety risks is the primary goal behind the concept of co-management, which is recommended by the Food Safety Modernization Act .

Wild and domestic animals destroy crops by eating and trampling them, and can pose food safety risks due to the deposition of potentially contaminated feces on or near the crops . Birds are one of the most challenging animals to keep out of agricultural fields, and they may harbor food borne pathogens. For example, European starlings are a source of Salmonella enterica at concentrated animal feeding operations , posing a greater risk of pathogen transfer than other variables like cattle density, facility management operations, and environmental variables . They also may be a significant source of other Salmonella spp, Escherichia coli O157, and other shiga toxin–producing E. coli . During a study at a CAFO in southern Arizona, 103 birds were tested for food borne pathogens. Two tested positive for Salmonella, and five tested positive for non-O157 Shiga toxinproducing E. coli. Other studies have shown similar results as documented in a review by Langholz and Jay-Russell where they listed 23 studies on food borne pathogen prevalence in birds, including positive results for ducks, gulls, starlings, and pigeons. A more recent review listed food borne pathogens specifically transmitted by wild birds . All reviews discuss a 2008 outbreak of Campylobacter related to pea consumption because it was one of few outbreaks directly linking the pathogen to a wildlife source, in this case, sandhill cranes . This highlights the potential risks to food safety associated with migratory birds. Damage and food safety risks from wildlife activities remain significant economic problems despite the use of a variety of methods to control bird and rodent pests . Yield loss and economic impacts vary by crop and region, but can be a substantial burden on growers . Growers of fresh produce try countless methods to deter birds. These deterrents fall into nine general categories . This paper is not intended to be an exhaustive review of bird deterrents, but instead we present an overview of the ones most used in the field, as well as methods that utilize multiple techniques in an effort to develop integrated pest management for nuisance bird control.

The array of visual bird deterrents is expansive, and includes lights that are flashing or rotating, searchlights, mirrors and reflectors, reflective tape, flags, rags, streamers, lasers, dogs, humans, scarecrows, raptor models, corpses, balloons with eye spots, kites, kite hawks, mobile predator models, and water dyes or colorants . All of these methods work to some degree for a short period of time until habituation. Lasers that were used to disperse crows, for example, resulted in an initial dispersion, but crows reoccupied their roosts the same night that the lasers were used, and none of the roosts were abandoned . Kite balloons were shown to be effective in the short term, but birds quickly become habituated, reducing the effectiveness over time . Similarly, balloons with eye spots have been used in an attempt to reduce damage to vineyard grapes in New Zealand, but growers reported no economically significant effect . Generally, balloons, scarecrows, hawk kites, and reflective tape work best with sound cannons or netting, described below . Noise deterrents are generally effective, but much like visual deterrents, birds easily become habituated to them,drainage planter pot decreasing their efficacy over time. They have the added issue that growers who use them are subject to complaints of nuisance noise from neighbors . Propane sound cannons are the most commonly used noise deterrent, but they need to be repositioned weekly and set to go off randomly every 7-20 minutes during daylight hours for the greatest effect. Since sound cannons usually make a hissing noise before sounding off, they give birds a warning to leave the area, and then they return after the explosive noise. Some of the other common noise deterrents include bangers, screamers, squawkers, whistlers, scare cartridges, and noise bombs . Even human presence can be used as a noise deterrent if they rattle cans, crack whips, yell, honk horns, or shoot guns . Human activity can be very effective at keeping nuisance birds out of fields when fields are small enough to drive or walk around, but it can be expensive to maintain a human guard on duty. Instead, some growers use synthetic sounds that offer unambiguous messages that elicit inter specific responses, like distress calls . They prevent habituation by varying the rhythm and number of signals emitted . In a study of alarm calls from crimson rosellas in orchards,researchers found that these birds were effectively deterred in the short- to medium-term . However, distress calls offer another challenge since they may be an invitation to nearby predators indicating that their next meal is ready. Broadcast units are a less expensive, more technologically advanced noise deterrent that reproduce accurate and effective birds calls that significantly reduce damage in vineyards .

Another moderately effective noise deterrent is the sonic net, which overlaps with the frequency range of bird vocalizations, making communication among a flock ineffective. When used at an airfield, researchers demonstrated an 82% reduction in birds in the sonic net area, and it remained effective after four weeks of exposure . Fencing is an effective non-lethal, long-term method used as a standard technique to minimize wildlife intrusion into agricultural lands . While fencing cannot be used to deter birds, netting can be. While noise deterrents used against juvenile starlings in a cherry orchard were shown to be ineffective, research suggests that the netting-in of an orchard would be more effective . However, while netting is the most effective method, it is also has some drawbacks. It is one of the most expensive methods for deterring birds due to the massive areas of crops that need to be covered . It can also be easily damaged, and it can be a hazard to wildlife. Other exclusions that are used with birds are electric fencing, overhead wires, and anti- perching devices, such as spikes, some of which are also considered tactile deterrents and forms of habitat modification described below. The concept of habitat modification to deter nuisance birds includes a wide array of activities, from providing better quality forage or shelter in alternate locations through lure crops or sacrificial crops to simply removing roost structures, food, and shelter, forcing birds to go elsewhere. In many cases, deterring nuisance birds from one field causes them to negatively impact neighboring farms. For that reason, Ainsley and Kosoy propose collective action on the part of neighboring farmers in which communal feeding plots are constructed to protect the fields of all farmers in a single area, thereby evenly distributing crop losses and maintaining stable bird populations in the ecosystem . The USDA’s Wildlife Services attempted this method when they began to cost share eight hectare Wildlife Conservation Sunflower Plots with sunflower growers to lure migrating blackbirds away from commercial sunflower fields. The targeted blackbirds ended up removing 10 times more sunflower seeds from the WCSP than from commercial fields, making this strategy an important part of an integrated pest management plan for commercial sunflower growers . Monk parakeets tend to damage corn and sunflower fields that are closest to man-made structures and adjacent trees, areas with tree patches around the crop fields, and areas with high availability of pasture and weedy and fallow fields . The removal of these landscape features that attract birds, like areas with structures for perching, breeding, and shelter, can cause birds to move out of an area . A recent study indicated that hedgerows harbor higher biodiversity of rodents, but that biodiversity does not spill over into wildlife intrusion into fields . While rodents differ from birds, the concept of wildlife utilizing adjacent habitat without affecting agricultural crops or impacting food safety is similar. Physiological methods of bird control include such things as chemo-sterilants, contraceptives, and immune- contraceptive vaccines . These are rarely, if ever, used by growers in agricultural areas because they require extensive permitting and veterinary oversight, often times making their use unfeasible. Linz, Bucher, et. al. identified four limiting factors hindering the use of contraceptive methods and lethal control of birds in agriculture, including: 1) the high cost of implementation combined with challenges related to maintaining long-term control of birds, 2) determining the population level in an area that would be considered acceptable and therefore serves as a level of success, 3) ensuring that the treatment would be directed only at the birds actually causing crop damage, and 4) managing immigration of non-treated birds. Chemical bird deterrents, such as taste and behavioral repellants, are expensive, difficult to apply, not as effective in the field as they are in the lab, need to be licensed, and some overlap with lethal deterrents.