The Centre for Agricultural Engineering delivers applied, practical and profitable research solutions that strengthen agricultural productivity and address environmental management challenges in Australia and overseas.
The Centre’s research focus includes irrigation and water resources management; farming systems innovation; energy efficiency and renewable energy; bioresource recycling; robotics, automation and machine vision.
For over 30 years, the Centre has been working with industry to develop more sustainable and efficient ways of using water sustainably to grow crops and support the environment. Irrigation research is conducted across a wide variety of agricultural industries nationally and internationally.
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Project Team: | | Dr Simon Kelderman | Ralph Shippam, TIA, University of Tasmania
Project Partners: | Dairy Australia
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淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is completing research on broad-acre surface irrigation, large centre pivots and lateral moves, to automatically optimise irrigation events with novel technologies developed by our Irrigation & Water Management team.
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Leader: Erik Schmidt
Project Team: | Lidya Agustina | Dr Jochen Eberhard | Ralph Shippam | Rupak Sarkar, UBKV (North Bengal Agricultural University) | Mohammad Mainuddin, CSIRO | Santosh Mali, Indian Council for Ag Research
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淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is supporting irrigation development in the Eastern Gangetic Plains, which include the Nepal Tarai, Bihar and West Bengal regions, and is one of the most densely populated, poverty-stricken belts in South Asia. The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research is investing in research aiming to improve the livelihood of women, marginal and tenant farmers in the Eastern Gangetic Plains, through improved water use and increased dry season agricultural production.
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Direct one-step measurement of water vapour flux from broad-acre irrigated cropping is a focus research area for the Irrigation & Water Management team at 淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering. The Cotton Research and Development Corporation is supporting this post-doctoral work of Dr Simon Kelderman to further refine sensor selection and deploy his novel system in commercial fields to allow industry to obtain direct crop evapotranspiration rates.
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The largest loss of water in the northern Murray-Darling Basin is the evaporation and seepage from on-farm water storages, and the Irrigation & Water Management team at 淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering remains keenly focussed on this “wicked” problem. The Cotton Research and Development Corporation is supporting this work to determine alternatives and further refine real commercial options for regional water managers across Australia to reduce this stored water loss.
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Title: Demonstrating and integrating irrigation technology for cotton
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Project focusses on enhancing the uptake of advanced irrigation management technology across irrigated grower communities with a three-pronged approach for: actively engaged grower cohort through demonstration and peer interaction, dedicated on-farm agronomic service providers who are continuing to seek more understanding of these irrigation technologies, and industry’s very active extension networks busily dealing with a wide range of broad industry challenges.
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Title: Advanced Field Sensing
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Development of a novel suite of automated machine vision tools that reduce reliance on workforce labour for agronomic scouting to potentially increase productivity and improve crop management decisions involving pests, crop growth, crop rotations, patch management and irrigation scheduling. The project will be delivered by engineers at 淘片资源网, and agronomists, entomologists and pathologists at QDPI.
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Title: Australian Cotton Disease Collaboration (ACDC) - Irrigation and nutrition management to reduce cotton wilt disease incidence and machine vision system development to detect and differentiate verticillium and fusarium wilts
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The expected industry outcomes and impact are that Australian cotton growers will have an improved understanding of the interactions between irrigation, nutrition and disease incidence for Verticillium and Fusarium wilt in both furrow and surface irrigation systems. This will contribute to reduced yield loss through understanding improved wilt. management options, increased water use efficiency when irrigating with a higher soil water deficit and increased profit through reduced fertiliser application and reduced disease incidence.
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Title: Advancing the adoption of climate-smart, innovative irrigation control technology for the cotton and dairy industries
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This project will develop a novel suite of automated machine vision tools to reduce reliance on labour and increase repeatability pests. The first 15 months will explore tools that could be used including infield insect activity for spray decisions, crop growth for canopy management, and diseases for crop rotation management. After the feasibility and impact of each tool is evaluated, ranked and a pathway for development identified, at least two of the tools will be refined and implemented in software for commercial adoption.
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Title: Water balance scoping study for Northern NSW/Queensland
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A desktop scoping study for research into the measurement techniques for a full season water balance of siphon-less broad-acre irrigation systems is to be conducted. A review of siphon-less irrigation system designs most commonly deployed across Northern NSW/Queensland will be completed through interaction with key designers and leading growers.
The research team delivers outcomes by combining agricultural sciences, agricultural inputs and practices, agronomic production databases and precision agriculture technologies to efficiently manage agronomic and livestock production systems.
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Title: Cassowary Coast Reef Smart Farming
Leader: Debra Telford | 淘片资源网 leader:
Project Team: | Bruen Smith | Debra Telford | Peter Becke | Maria Solis | Renee Cluff (CANEGROWERS Innisfail) | Dr John Pickering | Sam Moore (Evidn)
Project Partners: (Innisfail) |
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淘片资源网 Centre for Agricultural Engineering is partnering with CANEGROWERS Innisfail and Evidn Pty Ltd in a GBRF-funded project that aims to improve nitrogen-use efficiency (NUE) in sugarcane production systems.
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Title: Automated Small Plot Cotton Trial Picker
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Project Team: Bruen Smith | Tim Johnson
Project Partners: Cotton Seed Distributors (CSD) |
Funding Body: CSD | CSIRO
The purpose of this project is to develop a new automated on-board weighing system for a commercial 4 row seed cotton picker. The system will be developed for the existing JD7760/CP690 pickers.
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Title: Integrating soil and water management in vegetable production in Laos and Cambodia
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Project Team: Dr Jochen Eberhard | Erik Schmidt
Project Partners: Cambodia Agricultural Research and Development Institute | Clean Agriculture Development Centre | National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute | |
Funding Body: Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR)
This project aimed to improve soil and irrigation water management in Laos and Cambodia to achieve sustainably improved vegetable yields and households’ economies. Laos and Cambodia are developing economies seeking to improve crop yields for domestic consumption and export markets.
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Title: Are trends in silicon update a reason for concern?
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Investigating if trends in Silicon uptake are impacting crop performance, identify how various soil chemical properties may influence Si availability and if changes are required to soil and/or plant tissue assay critical values to ensure adequate Silicon nutrition.
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Assessing farming systems and residue management practices through monitoring of soils over time, assessment of sugarcane productivity, economic analysis of practice change and modelling (APSIM) to understand potential longer-term outcomes across a wider range of environments.
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Title: Air Operated Sample Probes
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Comprehensive modelling and field trials targeting 10 different grain receival sites will be conducted to validate the effectiveness of the existing and newly proposed protocols. Project aims to identify whether a sampling issues negatively affects grower profits.
The research team explores alternative energy, waste recovery and energy efficiency options that enable industry to generate self-sustaining energy systems and ultimately cater for their own energy needs. A key area of research focus is the conversion of agro-industrial waste into profitable clean energy with a focus on biogas and biofertilisers from organic waste.
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Leader: Professor Bernadette McCabe
Project Team: Dr Diogenes Antille (CSIRO) | | Dr Jochen Eberhard | Ms Seonmi
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Funding Body: Australian Research Council as part of its Industrial Transformation Research Hubs scheme
The University is a key partner in the NiCE Hub and is working with water utilities, Government departments, energy and resource companies, agricultural and horticultural businesses and local councils to investigate the value of biofertiliser from a range of organic waste streams.
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Title: Pilot to Paddock (P2) Innovative on-farm water, energy and nutrient technologies and practices for Australian Dairy, Egg, Pork and Cropping industries
Leader: Dr Stephan Tait
Project Team: | | Torben Grell |
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Funding Body: Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment as part of its Smart Farming Initiative program.
The University is taking the technical lead in this nationwide research, which is focused on taking manure from various agricultural industries and finding the best ways to turn it into valuable products that can be re-used back on farm.
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Project Team: | Lee Williams
Project Partners: Toowoomba and Surat Basin Enterprise |
Funding Body: Fight Food Waste CRC
Toowoomba is home to significant agricultural and food processing sectors and the project offers a unique opportunity to explore existing technologies to produce an income stream from waste. The project aims to map the quantity and quality of waste products that end up in local landfill and explore technologies available for converting it into high-value products such as energy and solid or liquid fertiliser.
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Project Team: Dr Diogenes Antille (CSIRO) |
Project Partners: Queensland State Government | Fight Food Waste CRC
Funding Body: Waste to Biofutures Fund, Queensland State Government
Funding from the Waste to Biofutures Fund has enabled the procurement of a lab scale granulator to develop specifications for novel, enhanced-biofertilisers that meet the requirements for field application using standard farm equipment (physical properties) and nutritional needs of crops (chemical composition).
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Title: Evaluation and demonstration of Ugold and Urval efficacy in field trials
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To demonstrate the processing technology at two geographical sites and three different location types (workplace, mobile, public), and demonstrate the fertilising power of novel urine-derived products in field-scale trials located in peri-urban agriculture settings and in urban parklands in two different geographical areas.
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Title: Addressing Topsoil Deficit Through Circularity: BHP Mitsubishi Alliance
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The project will take a novel circular economy approach to address topsoil deficits by investigating thermal carbonisation of mine and local biomass wastes to create biochar soil amendments that will make subsoils and spoils suitable for mine rehabilitation.
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Title: Guidance for on-farm greenhouse gas (GHG)
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Development of guidance on protocols, methods and metrics informing a national standard for quantifying GHG emissions and removals in agricultural systems, to ensure that a common approach to GHG accounting is applied across Australian agriculture, in quantifying farm emissions and the mitigation value of CRC innovations.
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Title: Sustainable future fuels: Advancing duckweed feedstock
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Aims to develop and test technology for producing duckweed using residue from anaerobic digestion (digestate) of dairy manure, and evaluate the duckweed as a source of biomass for biofuel production in Australia. Modelling results will be used to estimate potential economic value and gauge the value add duckweed contributes to Australian biofuel biomass feedstock estimates.
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Title: Pre-treatment of suitable solid wastes for improved anaerobic digestion
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Undertake laboratory testing to crosscheck with several UQ outcomes. Incorporate new feedstocks into 淘片资源网-developed decision support tool 'ADAdvisor'. Contribute to the development and delivery of a training package for operators of anaerobic digestion equipment at red meat processing facilities.
The team develops advanced robotic sensing technologies to enhance autonomy in crop production, biosecurity and animal welfare on-farm, with aims for on-farm adoption in the commercial farm conditions of today. The team also provides leadership on the integration of sensing systems with agricultural robotics into the future.
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Title: Machine vision monitoring of chicken welfare
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Funding Body: AgriFutures Australia
Technologies to estimate weight, uniformity and behaviours of meat chickens are being developed by 淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering and a commercial partner, which will assist farmers to meet production goals as well as monitoring chicken welfare.
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Title: Moon to Mars initiative
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Funding Body: Australian Space Agency through its Moon to Mars Demonstrator Feasibility Grant
淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering is developing novel machine vision technologies to monitor food plants on extended space missions and has recently completed a project for the Australian Space Agency.
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Title: Time motion analysis in the deboning of beef carcasses
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Funding Body: Oakey Beef Exports
Video analysis has been undertaken of the time taken for skilled butchers to achieve specific cuts from a beef carcass on a production line. The outcomes of this project will allow Oakey Beef Exports to evaluate the many improvements made on the production line since the 1960s and maintain a sustainable and competitive position in the meat processing market.
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Funding Body: Cotton Research and Development Corporation
淘片资源网’s Centre for Agricultural Engineering has developed an app ‘PestDetect’ that uses the smartphone’s camera and image analysis to detect and count silverleaf whitefly, leading to improved insect sampling in cotton crops. A follow-on project is targeting further priority crop attributes for crop protection.
This project uses access to the International Space Station (ISS) provided by industry partner Axiom Space to fly a fit-for-purpose plant chamber and demonstrate machine vision algorithms for plant health by 淘片资源网.
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Title: Tactile Sensing and AI for Robotic Beef Cutting
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This project aims to develop a robotic demonstrator for performing high-value beef cuts in the processing environment. The enabling technology for this development is tactile perception as the primary sensing method, potentially supported by additional sensors such as vision cameras.
The research team leads and directs the adoption of ag tech across a range of agricultural industries to improve profitability and farming practices.
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Title: Changing the Game - Resilience to seasonal variations and drought through ag tech
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To validate digital agriculture and automation at a commercial farm scale to inform decision making and assist to manage the risks associated with seasonal variations and drought preparedness in the grains industry through activities at Tosari Crop Research Centre.
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Assessment of the benefits derived from two ag technologies and industry readiness to adopt within the Australia grains industry - operator assisted leader follower technology in harvest operations and Augmenta as a platform to provide real time agronomic assessment and application of variable rate nitrogen in winter wheat crops.
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Title: Increasing extension capacity pilot in Southern Queensland
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Establishment of a pilot program to improve extension adoption of grains industry research on the Darling Downs and ensure effective and co-ordinated approach to engage and connect with grower advisors and other research providers and facilitate local extension and adoption activities including workshops, targeted training and demonstration trials.
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Title: Smart system for evaporation on polymer deployment
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Trialling and assessment of the use of drones for automated sensing and control operations for the application of polymer evaporation suppressants on water storages.
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Title: Optimising Floating Solar Covers for Evaporation Mitigation
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Undertake a series of configurations and optimisation assessments for floating photovoltaics. These assessments will determine the most cost effective system of floats and panels to i) optimise power generation ii) maximise evaporation mitigation and iii) minimise cost within the Australia cotton industry.
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Title: Profitable pulses in Pakistan
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Project Partners: Pakistan Agricultural Research Council
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To adopt a co-innovation approach, engaging farmers, researchers, policymakers, and private sector stakeholders to develop sustainable solutions for strengthening pulse production systems and understanding farmers and (potential) market opportunities in Pakistan.
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Title: Ripple Effect
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This project is funded by a grant from the Australian Government’s Natural Heritage Trust Climate-Smart Agriculture program.
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This project is a national, grower-led project designed to improve water security, biodiversity, and climate resilience for Australian farmers. Project activities will involve developing demonstration sites to quantify the potential of evaporation mitigation technologies.
