• HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
Monday, August 4, 2025
BIOENGINEER.ORG
No Result
View All Result
  • Login
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
  • HOME
  • NEWS
  • EXPLORE
    • CAREER
      • Companies
      • Jobs
        • Lecturer
        • PhD Studentship
        • Postdoc
        • Research Assistant
    • EVENTS
    • iGEM
      • News
      • Team
    • PHOTOS
    • VIDEO
    • WIKI
  • BLOG
  • COMMUNITY
    • FACEBOOK
    • INSTAGRAM
    • TWITTER
No Result
View All Result
Bioengineer.org
No Result
View All Result
Home NEWS Science News Chemistry

Autonomous weed control via smart robots

Bioengineer by Bioengineer
March 27, 2019
in Chemistry
Reading Time: 3 mins read
0
Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on LinkedinShare on RedditShare on Telegram

A drift-free, weed-specific pesticide applicator could enable autonomous weed control via smart robots — and help minimize exposure of crops and soil.

Credit: Hendrik Viljoen

WASHINGTON, D.C., March 27, 2019 — Driving across Iowa, Hendrik J. Viljoen, distinguished professor of chemical and biological engineering at the University of Nebraska, noticed that soybean fields were becoming increasingly infested with weeds each season. The culprit is a glyphosate-resistant weed called “palmer amaranth,” which is threatening crops in the Midwest.

One pesticide currently used for controlling palmer amaranth is “Dicamba,” but it has devastating effects on adjacent areas, harming trees and other crops, because it tends to drift when sprayed during windy conditions.

As a firm believer in the concept that our well-being is closely tied to the health of the crops and animals within our food chain, Viljoen reports in the journal Physics of Fluids, from AIP Publishing, that he was inspired to create a way to spot treat weeds that eliminates any risk of pesticide drift.

“A pesticide solution can be stabilized on a rotating horizontal cylinder/roller akin to a wooden honey dipper,” said Viljoen. “Its stability depends on the speed at which the applicator rotates. But the roller is only one part of a bigger process, and there are some technical details regarding the roller that we’re also addressing, namely replenishing the pesticide load via wicking from a reservoir at the center of the cylinder.”

The manner in which pesticides are applied to plants makes a difference. They can be sprayed from the top of the leaf, rolled on, or delivered by a serrated roller to simultaneously scuff it and apply the pesticide. “We will only arrive at an optimum design if we understand how the active ingredient in the pesticide is delivered to the weed, how it enters the phloem (the plant’s vascular system that transports the active ingredient), and the efficacy of its killing mechanism,” Viljoen explained.

To apply the pesticide to weeds, rollers can be mounted onto small robots or tractors. “Our current research objective is to develop a system where unmanned aerial vehicles image fields and feed the images to trained neural networks to identify the weeds,” he said. “The information on weed species and their exact location will then be used by the robots to spot treat the weeds.”

One key finding by Viljoen’s group is that the preferred way to operate the roller is to rotate it so that the original velocity at the roller’s underside coincides with the direction the robot is traveling. They’re now doing experiments to determine any uptake bias for palmer amaranth, as well as exploring making part of the roller’s surface serrated. “The idea is to physically penetrate the epidermis to enhance the amount of active ingredient that’s delivered to the weed,” he said. “To broaden our understanding, we’ve developed a mathematical model of the transport of the pesticide in the phloem.”

The significance of this work is that while there’s increasing pressure to produce enough food for a growing population, the current approach is unsustainable. The trend today is to use increased amounts and more potent chemicals to control weeds and invasive species that have developed resistance to previously effective pesticides.

“We must minimize the impact of our practices on the environment and reduce the use of chemicals, their residues and metabolites within our food chain and on the greater ecology,” Viljoen said. “Technologies exist that can help us achieve these goals. Precision spray technologies use artificial intelligence to identify weeds and only spray specific areas, but we can do better. We should eliminate the risk of drift and minimize exposure of crops and soil to pesticides.”

Developing a drift-free, weed-specific applicator will pave the way for autonomous weed control with smart robots. “At this stage, we can’t envision the full utility of these robots, but they offer us the opportunity to survey fields and alert us to disease breakouts, blights or nematodes,” said Viljoen. “In the future, the roller — with some modifications — could also be used to deliver small RNA molecules to plants. Smaller farm operations that focus on specialized products will likely be the first adopters of the technology.”

###

The article, “Stability analysis of a thin film on a rotating cylinder with low airflow,” is authored by Heather Newell and Hendrik J. Viljoen. It appeared in Physics of Fluids on March 12, 2019 (DOI: 10.1063/1.5080443). The article can be accessed at http://aip.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1063/1.5080443.

ABOUT THE JOURNAL

Physics of Fluids is devoted to the publication of original theoretical, computational, and experimental contributions to the dynamics of gases, liquids, and complex or multiphase fluids. See http://pof.aip.org.

Media Contact
Wendy Beatty
[email protected]

Related Journal Article

http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.5080443

Tags: Agricultural Production/EconomicsAgricultureChemistry/Physics/Materials SciencesEarth ScienceFertilizers/Pest ManagementFood/Food ScienceGeology/SoilPlant SciencesRobotry/Artificial IntelligenceTechnology/Engineering/Computer Science
Share12Tweet8Share2ShareShareShare2

Related Posts

blank

DGIST Advances Ultrasound Wireless Charging for Implantable Medical Devices

August 4, 2025
Advancing Clinical Gait Analysis with Generative AI and Musculoskeletal Simulation

Advancing Clinical Gait Analysis with Generative AI and Musculoskeletal Simulation

August 4, 2025

Breaking Boundaries: The Deaminative Giese Reaction Revolution

August 4, 2025

Catalytic C(sp2) Expansion of Alkylboranes

August 4, 2025
Please login to join discussion

POPULAR NEWS

  • blank

    Neuropsychiatric Risks Linked to COVID-19 Revealed

    65 shares
    Share 26 Tweet 16
  • Overlooked Dangers: Debunking Common Myths About Skin Cancer Risk in the U.S.

    61 shares
    Share 24 Tweet 15
  • Predicting Colorectal Cancer Using Lifestyle Factors

    46 shares
    Share 18 Tweet 12
  • Dr. Miriam Merad Honored with French Knighthood for Groundbreaking Contributions to Science and Medicine

    46 shares
    Share 18 Tweet 12

About

We bring you the latest biotechnology news from best research centers and universities around the world. Check our website.

Follow us

Recent News

Advanced Crop Monitoring System Integrating IoT and AI Unveiled at ASABE

August APA Journals Highlight Breakthroughs in Psychiatric Genetics, Telehealth Prescribing, Mental Health Advocacy, and Beyond

Small RNA Fragments Hold Major Promise in Advancing Cancer Treatment

  • Contact Us

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Homepages
    • Home Page 1
    • Home Page 2
  • News
  • National
  • Business
  • Health
  • Lifestyle
  • Science

Bioengineer.org © Copyright 2023 All Rights Reserved.