Research in Agricultural Engineering, 2025 (vol. 71), issue 1
Towards interpretability: Assessment of residual networks for tomato leaf disease classificationOriginal Paper
Raphael Berdin, Rob Christian Caduyac
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):1-9 | DOI: 10.17221/67/2024-RAE 
The tomato occupies a prominent place in the Philippines’ agricultural economy. However, tomato leaf diseases are challenges in tomato crop production leading to economic losses. Among the tomato leaf diseases, early blight and Septoria leaf spot are prevalent in the Philippines due to the climate. Thus, the accurate identification of diseases affecting tomato leaves is essential. Currently, a visual inspection is the primary method for diagnosing tomato leaf diseases which is time-consuming and inefficient. This study aims to develop a quantized Residual Network with convolutional 50 layer (ResNet-50) based model to classify tomato leaves...
Anaerobic bio-processing of agricultural waste for the biotechnological production of lactic acid and volatile fatty acid by landfill soil inoculumsOriginal Paper
Andriy Anta Kacaribu, Darwin Darwin, Yuliani Aisyah, Febriani
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):10-21 | DOI: 10.17221/52/2024-RAE
With the increase in the world population and the ensuing surge in organic waste, effective management strategies are crucial to prevent environmental pollution. This study aims to address this challenge by utilising organic waste (OW) as the substrate for the production of lactic acid (LA) and volatile fatty acids (VFAs) through anaerobic bioprocessing. The substrates used, included grass, starch, and fruit wastes inoculated with non-sterile inoculum landfill soil (LS). The anaerobic bioconversion was performed by varying the substrate to the inoculum. The results unveil that a digester loaded with 150 g·L–1 of fruit waste,...
An effective machine learning model for the estimation of reference evapotranspiration under data-limited conditionsOriginal Paper
Saravanan Karuppanan, Saravanan Ramasamy, Balaji Lakshminarayanan, Sreemanthrarupini Nariangadu Anuthaman
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):22-37 | DOI: 10.17221/101/2023-RAE
Reference crop evapotranspiration (ETo) is a vital hydrological component influenced by various climate variables that impact the water and energy balances. It plays a crucial role in determining crop water requirements and irrigation scheduling. Despite the availability of numerous approaches for estimation, accurate and reliable ETo estimation is essential for effective irrigation water management. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the most suitable machine learning model for assessing ETo using observed daily values of limited input parameters in tropical savannah climate regions. Three...
Development of smart micro-irrigation system using Arduino Uno for okra cultivation in BangladeshOriginal Paper
Sharmin Akter, Md Mostafizar Rahman, Rafatul Zannat, Md Masud Rana, Md Moinul Hossain Oliver, Md Aslam Ali
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):38-49 | DOI: 10.17221/18/2024-RAE
Conventional irrigation practices result in a substantial amount of water loss with okra cultivation. Although micro-irrigation can address this issue by delivering water directly near the rootzone, it requires manual operation. These issues, however, can be resolved with the introduction of a smart micro-irrigation system. This study aims to develop a smart micro-irrigation system for okra, in conjunction with the sub-components of drip irrigation, a microcontroller, and a soil sensor. The experiment was laid out with a randomised complete block design (RCBD) having three treatments: (i) control irrigation (T1), (ii)...
Particle motion in mixed flow dryers: The effect of the wall inclination angle and frictionOriginal Paper
Adrienn Bablena, János Beke, István Keppler
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):50-59 | DOI: 10.17221/51/2024-RAE
In Europe, the weather patterns require harvested grain crops to be dried before storage to prevent significant quality loss. The uneven movement of grains inside the drying equipment is a key issue affecting the drying process, causing under- or over drying the harvested crops and thus leading to quality degradation and ultimately to financial losses. To characterise the unevenness of material flow, we introduced a dimensionless displacement ratio. This dimensionless parameter was suitable for comparing the uniformity of the material movement processes within the dryer. Using experimental investigations and numerical simulations, we determined the...
Use of thermal imaging camera for wild animal detection along roadsOriginal Paper
Jiøí Bro¾ovský, Veronika Hartová, Martin Kotek, Jan Hart, Jitka Kumhálová
Res. Agr. Eng., 2025, 71(1):60-67 | DOI: 10.17221/88/2024-RAE
Vehicle collisions with wild animals are a common problem on roads, having a significant impact on road safety and wildlife populations. Collisions with wild animals are one of the most frequent road accidents. According to police statistics, there were nearly 16 000 road accidents caused by collisions with animals in the Czech Republic in 2019. Collisions with deer are the most common. There are several technologies and measures that can help reduce the risk of a vehicle colliding with a wild animal. One of the technologies used is a night vision system based on infrared spectrum sensing. This technology is slowly becoming part of the...