Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Sujitha Elango Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, Agricultural Engineering College and Research Institute, TNAU, Kumulur, Trichy, Tamil Nadu, India Author-Name: Nagarajan Madasamy Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, Agricultural Engineering College and Research Institute, TNAU, Kumulur, Trichy, Tamil Nadu, India Author-Name: Valliammai Annamalai Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Irrigation and Drainage Engineering, Agricultural Engineering College and Research Institute, TNAU, Kumulur, Trichy, Tamil Nadu, India Author-Name: Vijayaprabhakar Arumugam Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Agriculture, TNAU, Kumulur, Trichy, Tamil Nadu, India Title: Optimisation of the irrigation requirement of okra under protected cultivation using a digital lysimeter Abstract: A field experiment was conducted in 2023 and 2024 to determine stage-specific crop coefficient values of okra (Abelmoschus esculentus) using the popular F1 hybrid Arka Nikita. Six evapotranspiration (ETc) based treatments were applied: five under a forced ventilated greenhouse (T1 = 120% ETc, T2 = 100% ETc, T3 = 80% ETc, T4 = 60% ETc, T5 = 100% ETc in lysimeter) and one under open field (T6 = 100% ETc) arranged in a completely randomised block design with three replications. The results showed that T2 had higher growth parameters, while T4 and T6 performed poorly. The yield was significantly higher in T2 (23.8 t/ha in 2023 and 23.3 t/ha in 2024), whereas T6 had a lower yield (9.5 t/ha in 2023 and 8.6 t/ha in 2024). Higher water productivity was observed in T3 (9.85 kg/m3 in 2023 and 8.35 kg/m3 in 2024), while T6 had lower water productivity (1.83 kg/m3 in 2023 and 1.35 kg/m3 in 2024). Hence, this study recommends using stage-specific crop coefficients of 0.32, 0.63, 0.78, and 0.41 during the initial, development, mid and final stages of 80% ETc to optimise the water productivity and maximise the yield in the greenhouse-grown okra, respectively. Keywords: lysimeter, precision agriculture, soil moisture sensor, water use efficiency Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 200-212 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 DOI: 10.17221/31/2025-RAE File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/31/2025-RAE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0001.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:31-2025-RAE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Hamid Reza Gazor Author-Workplace-Name: Agricultural Engineering Research Institute (AERI), Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization, Karaj, Iran Author-Name: Omid Reza Roustapour Author-Workplace-Name: Agricultural Engineering Research Institute (AERI), Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization, Karaj, Iran Title: Study on the drying kinetics of Rosa flower buds using different drying methods Abstract: This study investigated the drying kinetics of Rosa flower buds (Rosa damascene Mill) under environmental conditions (shade), as well as in direct and indirect solar dryers. The effects of 40 °C, 50 °C, and 60 °C temperatures on the drying of the buds were also examined using a laboratory cabinet dryer. The drying rate of the Rosa flower buds was compared with various mathematical models, and the parameters of these models were evaluated. The results illustrated that drying Rosa flower buds under shade required a lengthy period time of approximately 13 days. In contrast, utilising solar dryers significantly reduced the drying period time for Rosa flower buds. Also, compared to the ambient drying method, the use of indirect solar dryers had the most substantial effect on decreasing the drying period time of the buds up to 86.6%. Furthermore, applying a temperature of 60 °C in the laboratory dryer reduced the drying time of the buds by 76.2% compared to a temperature of 40 °C. The Midilli et al. model (MDM), Page model (PM) and approximate diffusion model (ADM) demonstrated a good fit with the experimental data and can be employed to represent the drying behaviour of Rosa flower buds. The effective of moisture diffusivity of Rosa flower buds during drying was found to be in a range from 6.87 × 10-12 to 1.89 × 10-10 m2.s-1 and the activation energy values were determined as 65.30 and 72.80 kJ∙mol-1 for buds which were dried in the laboratory cabinet dryer and those dried using the ambient and solar dryer methods, respectively. Keywords: activation energy, modelling, solar, moisture diffusivity, heated air Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 213-223 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 DOI: 10.17221/43/2025-RAE File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/43/2025-RAE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0002.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:43-2025-RAE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Ngo Quoc Viet Author-Workplace-Name: Faculty of Information Technology, Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Author-Name: Thai Yen Author-Workplace-Name: Faculty of Information Technology, Ho Chi Minh City University of Education, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Title: Detection of heat-stressed chickens in poultry house based on deep network and optical flow vectors in the Fourier domain Abstract: The productivity and quality of the entire flock are negatively impacted by heat stress in chickens, which can have major repercussions, particularly in crowded farming settings where diseases are easy to spread and hard to control. This study uses deep networks and optical flow to identify heat stress in chickens. The technique focuses on identifying obvious signs of heat stress, such as panting and open-mouth breathing in chickens. There are two phases to the suggested approach: (1) using a deep network to detect open-mouth breathing in chickens; (2) using the Gunnar Farnebäck algorithm to compute the optical flow vectors of the wattle, the breathing frequency is estimated in the Fourier domain for the detection of panting chickens. The proposed method was tested on the obtained dataset and demonstrated its ability to recognise heat-stressed chickens in crowded conditions, achieving an overall performance metric of 0.90 by integrating the results of both phases. The two-phase approach, which incorporates the open-mouth breathing behaviour and panting frequency, improves the efficiency and assures robust, reliable heat stress detection. Keywords: animal welfare, Fourier transform, motion estimation, panting detection, thermal stress Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 189-199 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 DOI: 10.17221/46/2025-RAE File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/46/2025-RAE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0003.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:46-2025-RAE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Chi Dung Nguyen Author-Workplace-Name: PhD Student, Institute of Food and Biotechnology, Can Tho University, Can Tho city, Vietnam Author-Name: Hong Van Hao Author-Workplace-Name: PhD Student, Institute of Food and Biotechnology, Can Tho University, Can Tho city, Vietnam Author-Name: Ngoc Giau Tran Author-Workplace-Name: PhD Student, Institute of Food and Biotechnology, Can Tho University, Can Tho city, Vietnam Author-Name: Minh Thuy Nguyen Author-Workplace-Name: PhD Student, Institute of Food and Biotechnology, Can Tho University, Can Tho city, Vietnam Author-Name: Ngo Van Tai Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Food and Biotechnology, Can Tho University, Can Tho city, Vietnam Title: Effect of foam-mat drying conditions on drying rate and anthocyanin content in purple sweet potato powder Abstract: The study aimed to optimise foam-mat drying parameters for producing purple-fleshed sweet potato (PFSP) powder. Egg albumin (EA) (5-15%), xanthan gum (XG) (0.1-0.5%), and drying temperature (50-70 °C) were used as independent variables for optimisation via Response Surface Methodology with a Box-Behnken design. The response variables (drying rate and anthocyanin content) were assessed by 18 treatments, which included 6 central points. The analysis of variance showed a high coefficient of determination (> 88%) between predicted and experimental values across all models. Optimal foam-mat drying conditions were 11.02% EA, 0.34% XG, and 65.1 °C to achieve the highest drying rate (2.49 g water.g dry matter-1.min-1) and anthocyanin content (1.01 mg.g-1). After 3.5 h of drying at 65.1 °C, the foam-mat dried PFSP showed a low moisture content (4.35%) and water activity (0.29). Its water solubility index, water absorption index, rehydration ratio, total polyphenols, and antioxidant activity were determined to be 56.49%, 3.55%, 3.82, 3.66 ± 0.06 mg GAE.g-1, and 58.49 ± 0.88%, respectively. Under these conditions, the powder maintained its natural beautiful and characteristic purple colour. The microstructure of the foam-mat dried PFSP powder (via SEM images) was also observed. Keywords: foam-mat drying, microstructure, nutritional quality, optimisation, purple sweet potato Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 224-234 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 DOI: 10.17221/84/2025-RAE File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/84/2025-RAE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0004.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:84-2025-RAE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Anatoliy Tryhuba Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Information Technology, Faculty of Mechanics, Energy and Information Technology, Lviv National Environmental University, Lviv, Ukraine Author-Name: Orest Filkin Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Information Technology, Faculty of Mechanics, Energy and Information Technology, Lviv National Environmental University, Lviv, Ukraine Author-Name: Inna Тryhuba Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Information Technology, Faculty of Mechanics, Energy and Information Technology, Lviv National Environmental University, Lviv, Ukraine Author-Name: Andriy Tatomyr Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Information Technology, Faculty of Mechanics, Energy and Information Technology, Lviv National Environmental University, Lviv, Ukraine Author-Name: Oksana Malanchuk Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Biophysics, Faculty of Mechanics, Danylo Halytsky Lviv National Medical University, Lviv, Ukraine Title: Architecture of a cyber-physical system for washing agricultural machinery Abstract: This paper presents the architecture of a cyber-physical system for the automated washing of agricultural machinery, designed to enhance efficiency and intelligent control. The system includes four layers - physical, sensor, computational, and interface and integrates actuators, sensors, decision-making modules, and analytics. A Python-based simulation using Control and SimPy showed an average washing time of 10.4 minutes and 97.5% cycle initiation accuracy under critical contamination. The Control was achieved via gated recurrent unit (GRU) prediction and proportional-integral-derivative (PID) regulation. Despite assumptions like ideal sensors and fixed conditions, the system proved feasible, with the future work targeting real-world validation and digital twin development. Keywords: intelligent mechatronic architecture, field equipment, intelligent washing system, simulation, digital twin, automation Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 235-246 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/artkey/rae-202504-0005_architecture-of-a-cyber-physical-system-for-washing-agricultural-machinery.php File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0005.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:91-2025-RAE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Joseph Kofi Conduah Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering, University of Cape Coast, Ghana Author-Name: Francis Kumi Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering, University of Cape Coast, Ghana Author-Name: Hans Fumba Murangaza Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Soil Sciences, Catholic University of Bukavu, Democratic Republic of the Congo Author-Name: Seth Osei Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering, University of Cape Coast, Ghana Title: Biodegradable seedling pots from sawdust and spent mushroom compost Abstract: Circular bioeconomy is rapidly gaining ground in the agricultural sector with priority given to the utilisation of more environmentally friendly materials for production and processing. Thus, in this study, biodegradable seedling pots were developed using sawdust (SD) and spent mushroom compost (SMC) as a sustainable alternative to plastic containers. Four pots composed of SMC : SD ratios of 100 : 0, 70 : 30, 60 : 40, and 50 : 50 were developed and evaluated. The mechanical properties, structural characteristics, and water absorption capacity of the pots were assessed and seedlings were made to grow in them to monitor the growth support potential. A universal tensile test machine was used to assess the indirect tensile strength (mechanical properties), while a scanning electron microscope was used to examine the morphology of the samples. Also, images of the seedling roots were segmented and analysed in ImageJ and WinRHIZO software to determine the root system architecture. The results demonstrated that the 60 : 40 ratio exhibited superior performance including having optimal water absorption capacity, indirect tensile strength, and structural properties. The 70 : 30 ratio also showed comparable tensile strength values. However, increasing the SMC content in the pot improved the root developments. This research presents a viable solution for converting agricultural waste into environmentally friendly seedling containers and suggests a potential option for reducing the dependency on plastic pots in agriculture. Keywords: circular economy, growth, ratios, structure, tensile properties, water absorption Journal: Research in Agricultural Engineering Pages: 247-258 Volume: 71 Issue: 4 Year: 2025 DOI: 10.17221/116/2025-RAE File-URL: http://rae.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/116/2025-RAE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/rae-202504-0006.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlrae:v:71:y:2025:i:4:id:116-2025-RAE