University: WUR-1
Faculty: Farm Technology Group
Biodegradable sensing for agricultural production
The TT position at Wageningen University will investigate use of biodegradable sensors in context of sustainable agriculture and optimization of primary resources such as water, fertilizer while maintain the yield. The research will focus on different scenarios in which such sensors are a real asset, which parameters to measure, where and how often, what are the specificities to consider for several types of crops, climates, and seasons through learning-based algorithms. The use of sensors will be modelled and validated in both laboratory and field studies, to better support producers and efficient agriculture.
University: WUR-2
Faculty: Bio Nano Technology Group
Biodegradable sensing for agricultural production
A PhD will work on biodegradable and 3D printable materials, where material, size and shape will be investigated for durability, functionality, lifetime and degradability/recyclability.
University: TUDelft
Faculty: Electronic Instrumentation
Sensor physics in design and fabrication
The TT position at TU Delft will focus on designing biodegradable sensors for agriculture. These sensors will be made of materials safe for soil, plants, and groundwater, eliminating risk of pollution during or after use. The sensors will be manufactured by sustainable microfabrication technologies, allowing miniaturization of different sensor functions and their reliable large-scale production. The selected materials will also be considered from the point of view of their production chain, investigating aspects related to industrial ecology, sustainable processes, and circular economy. As the consortium is rather large, the presence of one (2-yr) post-doc in ECTM as a starting package for the communication between other TUs and also daily supervision of PhD researchers and master students is essential. Moreover, the plan is to initiate a dedicated laboratory at TUD. Having a postdoc on board will be very helpful in establishing/running this lab.
University: UT
Faculty: Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Science
Biodegradable network of sensors
The TT position at the University of Twente will aim at the development of IoT and ICT system for partially or fully biodegradable electronic sensing devices, that are operational for a predetermined period of operation, allowing the wireless transmission of data. Different transmitter-, receiver-, antenna- and power transfer architectures will be investigated, as well as suitable materials to produce them. The goal is to research sensing devices that are made of 100% green and biodegradable electronics. These sensors will be capable of transmitting sensor data to a crucial point, possibly via multi-hop protocols, where this data will be further processed to be used to optimize growing conditions.
University: TU/e
Faculty: Control Systems Technology
Modelling and control for biodegradable systems
The TT position at TU Eindhoven will focus on mixed data-driven and model-based digital twinning for the analysis and synthesis of decision-making support systems and its application to multi-bot agrobotic systems. Such systems will help the farmers to make the right decisions based on the large amount of data collected by the sensor network. Disturbances due to varying locations, varying communication delays, sensor noise, and varying sampling rates will be explicitly accounted for. Multi-bot agrobotic systems will facilitate smart precision agriculture through distributed sensing and actuation. The aspect of biodegradability will impose temporal constraints on what can be/need to be sensed/done at a particular time in the crop’s life cycle, which constraints will play an important role in the control design.