Our Project

With NASA gearing up for the Artemis program and space exploration expanding rapidly to accommodate life beyond Earth, there exists a need to grow food autonomously that can support humans reliably, without compromising valuable time, or energy, from other missions in space. Therefore, students across multiple disciplines joined forces to build an Autonomous Multiple Cycle Farming System (AMCF) that grows plants autonomously through robotic functions with limited human interaction for multiple cycles.

How it works

The phases of the system

Phases of the system





Configuration to the Farming User Station and features

The Farming User Station interacts with the Growth Chamber over Wi-Fi

All software features can run on the actual hardware shown in the video above

If you would like to see extended videos of the software controlling the hardware email: cmillsap2013@my.fit.edu

1. It starts with a configuration file

To streamline the farming process the first step in configuring the Farming chamber is for botanists, or other plant specialists, to write out each of the phases of the chamber according to the crop type. Configuration files are loaded to the Farming User Station by the system administrator. Each crop needs different treatment by the growth chamber in order to grow.


Partial Configuration File

Simulation of Configuration File with Driver & (Task Manager/Scheduler) Running on actual Growth Chamber microcontroller




The phases of the system

A loaded Configuration Library

2. Next, The Configuration Library

Once all the configurations are loaded to the Growth Chamber User Station, the astronaut can access these files in the configuration library and easily load them to connected Farming Chambers

The User Station is scalable with many different crop configurations as long as the Growth Chamber has been built to accommodate




3. Manual Control and Editing

Astronauts can manually control the selected Farming Chamber and edit the loaded configuration files under "phase configuration". Astronauts may need to make changes to loaded configuration files because microgravity can have unforeseen effects on crops growing in the chamber.


The phases of the system

- Selected Growth Chamber prompt -

This feature allows the astronaut to choose four functions:

1. Manual Control 2. Phase configuration, 3. Configuration History 4. Reports


The phases of the system

- Manual control -

An alert shows for each action on whether or not it succeeded.

This control panel gives the astronaut direct control of the farming Chamber.


The phases of the system

- Astronaut editing a configuration file -

Astronauts can change values in white boxes using the green sliders.

Value ranges for sliders are limited by component type and are set by the system administrator



Other notable features


- Farming Chamber reports -

Provides feedback on sensors and motors running for the selected device

Bar graph: uptime of components on Farming Chamber, Pie chart: duration of each phase

The phases of the system

- Farming Chamber configuration file version control -

The history of each file is recorded, any changes made by the user will be shown here

The user can also select any file in this list to edit and reload it to the Chamber

The phases of the system

- Manage multiple Farming Chambers over multiple locations -

System administrators can load any number of farming chambers to the Farming User Station and control user access via Lightweight Directory Access Protocol

The phases of the system


Zero Gravity Experiment:

In September 2021 our Florida Tech research team took our newly built autonomous farming prototype to Ft. Lauderdale for running zero gravity tests on the modified Boeing 727-200, G-FORCE ONE.The first day was spent securing the experiment named "AMCFD" or Autonomous multi-cycle farming device, to the aircraft and running final ground tests.The rest of the days started around 4am due to military exercises being done in the airspace that week; initially we were supposed to start around 8:30am each day.Once we arrived at the airport breakfast was catered and a flight overview was given. Once ready we would board the jet and take off to the Gulf of Mexico. We were given around 15 minutes to run diagnostics on our setup along with the other researchers aboard, after this we were instructed to lay on our backs to practice body-control for those of us experiencing weightlessness for the first time.The weightlessness was achieved through parabolic flight and we would experience little to zero gravity for roughly thirty seconds a time over the course of 25-30 parabolas.


The Farming Device

- The Autonomous Farming Device -

(Left the final device built by Chris, Trupti, & Dom) After our team became adjusted, we began to run the experiment programs we designed. The first was to measure fluid movement using capillary action. Our initial configurations forced too much water through the system with more force than necessary; we corrected this by minimizing the force of the linear actuator by 99%. After the correction the water flowed as expected and the experiment that day was a success.


Test Team

- The Entire Test Team -

The next few days were used to evaluate the seed delivery mechanism. The interesting thing about parabolic flights is that while you get to experience weightlessness at one point in the parabola at another you can feel up to twice your bodyweight; our seeding mechanism behaved erratically due to the extreme change in its weight. We adjusted it to run only while in zero gravity (which was the only applicable use case we needed to prove worked). After the adjustment the seeding apparatus behaved as expected and the experiment was a success.


Shenanigans

- Shenanigans -

It was also fun!


More updates coming soon! (10-13-22)