Multi-Sensor Crop Monitoring for Cacao Production (SeMoCa)

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Multi-Sensor Crop Monitoring for Cacao Production (SeMoCa) is a joint research project of the Technische Unversität Ilmenau and the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg in cooperation with the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in Medellin, Colombia. The objective of the project is to devise, investigate and validate a concept for a technical system for monitoring cacao plants and their fruits in order to prepare the ground for a development of such a system (proof of concept). This system shall support small- and medium-scale cacao farms in Colombia to increase their harvesting margins and to improve the forecast, by detecting, monitoring and interpreting the state of the plants and fruits, particularly anomalies (i.e. diseases or drought). The system consists of a camera as well as a radar system whose measurement data are fused for plant monitoring. In contrast to existing systems for monitoring of agricultural areas the proposed system is carried by a human. Uncommon is the mobile use of radar technology for plant monitoring and the sensor data fusion of radar and a optical sensor. Furthermore, the opinion of experts (e.g. the plantation owner) shall be included into the interpretation of state estimation. The research focus is on the technical realization of the mobile radar system and the sensor data fusion with the optical sensor (lead TU Ilmenau) as well as the world modeling including state estimation of the cacao plantation (lead FAU). Additionally, these topics shall be researched in a manner that the basic principles can be transferred to other species of plants.