From Idea to Reality
Smart Greenhouse was designed and developed by a team of three developers, myself included. We designed a greenhouse that would fully automate the plant growing process and monitor the plants so that they are always under ideal conditions for growing.
Inside the greenhouse, there are sensors for monitoring the conditions and actuators for manipulating the conditions whenever necessary. Moisture sensors within the plants' soil measure the moistness of the soil as a percentage value (0-100%), where a higher value corresponds to more moisture. Temperature and air humidity sensors monitor the air quality and temperature. Lighting sensor monitors the amount of light the plants are getting in real-time (Low, Ideal or High amount).
Based on the sensor measurements, the program activates different actuators to keep the conditions inside the greenhouse ideal for the selected species. LED Growing lights that get activated whenever the plants aren't getting enough sun light per day. Watering system that gets activated when the moisture of plants' soil has been low for certain amount of time. Ventilation that gets activated when the air temperature and/or air humidity inside the greenhouse get too high.
The sensors and actuators are connected to a microprocessor, functioning as the "brain" of the greenhouse. On the program running on the microprocessor, there are different preprogrammed "Ideal Conditions" -metrics for different plant species. The user is able to select from these preprogrammed species one that matches the plants the user wants to grow.
Prototype
The team built a prototype of the idea and all the images on this page are of the prototype. I was personally responsible of the programming as well as 3D-modeling & 3D-printing the parts required for the prototype.
The prototype is built from 100% recyclable materials. Arduino Uno microcontroller functions as the "brains" of the greenhouse prototype.
For the prototype, we decided to cut some functionalities due to budgetary and time constraints. Compared to the functionalities in the original design (mentioned in "From Idea to Reality" section), the prototype is missing the watering system, LED growing lights and the ventilation system. Adding these functionalities would require a stronger power source and potentially another microcontroller.
The prototype includes all the sensors for monitoring the conditions inside the greenhouse. User can see the current conditions inside the greenhouse from a LCD screen which displays Temperature as Celsius degrees (T), Air Humidity % (H), Soil Moisture % (M) and the amount of light the plant is receiving 'Low', 'Ideal' or 'High' (L).
Processes used: 3D Modeling, 3D Printing, 2D Modeling, Laser Cutting, PCB Designing, Electric Circuit Prototyping, Programming (C++)
