Nitrogen (N) fertilizer rate is important for high yield and good quality of potato tubers. In this dissertation, I seek to study the response of different potato cultivars under different N fertilizer rates and how that can impact tuber quality, examine the performance of active optical sensors in improving a potato yield prediction algorithm, and evaluate the ability of active optical sensors (GreenSeeker (GS) and Crop Circle (CC)) to optimize a N recommendation algorithm that can be used by potato growers in Maine. This research was conducted at 11 sites over a period of two years (2018–2019) in Aroostook County, Maine; all sites depended on a rainfed system. Three potato cultivars, Russet Burbank, Superior, and Shepody, were planted under six rates of N (0-280 kg ha-1), ammonium sulfate and ammonium nitrate, and were applied in a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with four replications. Active optical sensor readings (normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI)) were collected weekly after the fourth leaf stage began. The coefficient of determination (R2) between soil organic matter (OM) content and total tuber yield for all sites combined was 0.78**. Sites with ≥ 30 g kg-1 of soil OM produced higher total tuber yield, marketable yield, and tuber weight per plant (39.45%, 45.22%, and 54.94%, respectively) than sites with ≤ 30 g kg-1 of OM. Specific gravity increased by 0.18% in the sites with ≥ 30 g kg-1 of OM. The total tuber yield for the three cultivars was maximized at 168 kg N ha-1. Vegetation indices measurements obtained at stages of 16 or 20 fully expanded leaves were significantly correlated with tuber yield, which can be used in the yield prediction model. Sensor measurements obtained at the 20th leaf stage were significantly correlated with tuber yield, with the exponential model showing the best fit for the regression curve. The recommended N rate calculated based on in-season sensor readings was reduced by approximately 12–14% compared to the total N rate that growers currently apply based on the conventional approach.
Polyaniline Multi walled Carbon nanotubes (PANI/MWCNTs) nanocomposite thin films have been prepared by non-equilibrium atmospheric pressure plasma jet on glass substrate with different weight percentage of MWCNTs 1, 2, 3, 4%. The diameter of the MWCNTs was in the range of 8-55 nm and length - - 55 55 μm. the nanocomposite thin films were characterized by UV-VIS, XRD, FTIR, and SEM. The optical studies show that the energy band gap of PANI/MWCNTs nanocomposites thin films will be different according to the MWCNTs polyaniline concentration. The XRD pattern indicates that the synthesized PANI/MWCNTs nanocomposite is amorphous. FTIR reveals the presence of MWCNTs nanoparticle embedded into polyaniline. SEM surface images show that the MWCNT
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Copper oxide thin films were synthesized by using spray pyrolysis deposition technique, in the temperature around 400°C in atmosphere from alcoholic solutions. Copper (II) chloride as precursor and glass as a substrate. The textural and structural properties of the films were characterized by atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction (XRD). The average particle size determined from the AFM images ranged from 30 to 90 nm and the roughness average was equal to 9.3 nm. The XRD patterns revealed the formation of a polycrystalline hexagonal CuO. The absorption and transmission spectrum, band gap, film thickness was investigated. The films were tested as an |
In this research, beam expander, BEX, is explained and designed for illuminating the
remote flying target. The BEX is optically designed to be suited for Nd:YAG laser of given
specifications. The BEX is modified to be zoom one to meet the conditions of preventing the
receiving unit; i.e the photodetector, from getting saturated at near and far laser tracking.
Decollimation could be achieved by automatic motor, which controls zoom lens of the BEX
according to the required expansion ratio of beam expander
In this paper a thin films of selenium was prepare on substrates of n-Si by evaporation in a vacuum technique with thickness about 0.5μm. And then an annealing process was done on samples at two temperature (100 and 200) C ° in a vacuum furnace (10-3 torr).
Some structural, optical and mechanical properties of prepared thin films were measured. Results showed that the prepared film was the crystallization, optical transmittance and micro hardness of the prepared thin films increased significantly after annealing.
The properties of structural and optical of pure and doped nano titanium dioxide (TiO2) films, prepared using chemical spray pyrolysis (CPS) technique, with different nanosize nickel oxide (NiO) concentrations in the range (3-9)wt% have been studied. X-Ray diffraction (XRD) technique where using to analysis the structure properties of the prepared thin films. The results revealed that the structure properties of TiO2 have polycrystalline structure with anatase phase. The parameters, energy gap, extinction coefficient, refractive index, real and imaginary parts were studied using absorbance and transmittance measurements from a computerized ultraviolet visible spectrophotometer (Shimadzu UV-1601 PC) in the wavelength
... Show MoreIn this work, pure and Ag-doped nickel oxide (NiO) thin films were deposited on glass substrates with different dopant concentrations (0.1, 0.2, 0.3 and 0.4 wt.%) by pulsed-laser deposition (PLD) technique at room temperature. These films were annealed at temperature of 450 °C. The structural and optical properties of the prepared thin films were studied. It was found that annealing process has lead to increase the transmittance of the deposited films. Also, the transmittance was found to increase with doping concentration of silver in the deposited NiO films. The optical energy gap was decreased from 3.5 to 3.2 eV as the doping concentration was increased to 0.4 %.
Nanoparticles of Pb1-xCdxS within the composition of 0≤x≤1 were prepared from the reaction of aqueous solution of cadmium acetate, lead acetate, thiourea, and NaOH by chemical co-precipitation. The prepared samples were characterized by UV-Vis spectroscopy(in the range 300-1100nm) to study the optical properties, AFM and SEM to check the surface morphology(Roughness average and shape) and the particle size. XRD technique was used to determine the crystalline structure, XRD technique was used to determine the purity of the phase and the crystalline structure, The crystalline size average of the nanoparticles have been found to be 20.7, 15.48, 11.9, 11.8, and 13.65 nm for PbS, Pb0.75Cd0.25S,
... Show MoreThis study discussed the effects of doping with silver (Ag) on the optical and structural properties of
CdO nanoparticles at different concentrations 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 wt% prepared by the precipitation method. The
materials were annealed at 550˚C for 1 h. The structural, topographical, and optical properties were
diagnosed by X-ray diffraction analysis, atomic force instrument, and visible and ultraviolet spectrometers.
The results show that the average diameter of the grains depends on the percentage of added silver to the
material, as the diameter decreased from 88.8 to 59.7 nm, and it was found that the roughness increased from
5.56 to 26.5. When studying the optical properties, it was noted that th
Optical burst switching (OBS) network is a new generation optical communication technology. In an OBS network, an edge node first sends a control packet, called burst header packet (BHP) which reserves the necessary resources for the upcoming data burst (DB). Once the reservation is complete, the DB starts travelling to its destination through the reserved path. A notable attack on OBS network is BHP flooding attack where an edge node sends BHPs to reserve resources, but never actually sends the associated DB. As a result the reserved resources are wasted and when this happen in sufficiently large scale, a denial of service (DoS) may take place. In this study, we propose a semi-supervised machine learning approach using k-means algorithm
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