Smart Farming Lab

Resilient and Sustainable Food Production

Welcome to the Smart Farming Lab for resilient and sustainable food production at Clausthal University of Technology. At the Smart Farming Lab, we conduct interdisciplinary research and explore solutions for resilient and sustainable food production in the context of climate change, environmental pollution, and resource scarcity.

Infrastructure

Smart Greenhouse & Farmbot

In our Smart Greenhouse, we produce a variety of seasonal vegetables, such as lettuce, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, and various herbs.

The centrepiece of the Smart Greenhouse is the FarmBot – an open-source farming project for precision agriculture consisting of a Cartesian coordinate robot, software and documentation, including data storage for farming data. The project aims to create an open and accessible technology that helps anyone to grow food. In our Smart Farming Lab, we have a FarmBot used in lectures, seminars and research projects to explore and test resilient and sustainable food and livelihood strategies.

Additional Outdoor Growing Setups

Besides our Smart Greenhouse, we operate additional outdoor setups to grow further produce, ranging from simple plants in pots to outdoor hydroponic systems.

Gourmet Mushroom Production

We operate grow tents equipped with various sensors and automation features that house our gourmet mushrooms, such as oyster mushrooms, king oyster mushrooms, and shiitakes.

The mushrooms are grown in a sensor-array controlled growing chamber similar to traditional industrial mushroom farms. However, instead of using non-reusable plastic bags, the mushrooms are grown in reusable pods linked to a digital twin. The growth status and the mushrooms’ health are regularly checked via cameras. An AI model processes the camera input to detect whether the mushrooms are ready to be harvested. The later integrated automated harvesting system will then be activated towards carrying out its task. Finally, the mushrooms are ready for consumption, and the pods remain in the growing chamber.

Vertical Farming Tower

Indoor vertical farming systems aim to enable sustainable and self-sufficient food production independent of the external environment. Parameters such as humidity, temperature, lighting conditions and optimum nutrient concentrations must be continuously monitored and adjusted in order to create optimum growth conditions for the plants.

In many vertical farming projects, lettuce and similar plants are grown with a low energy density since they have simple growth requirements and are, therefore, attractive for vertical (indoor) farming. Our goal is to enable the production of plants with higher energy density (e.g., tomatoes or lentils, beans and chickpeas, and potatoes, which are also rich in fibre and protein) to provide a real alternative for nutritional issues.

While our Smart Greenhouse is limited to seasonal production, our indoor vertical farming tower allows for an all-year production of heavy greens. The Vertical Farming Tower is a so-called Hydroponic system in which we grow plants using a water-based nutrient solution rather than traditional soil.

Live Streams

Some of our food production facilities are equipped with video cameras.
Check out the live streams, which are updated every hour.

Smart Greenhouse – Camera 1

Smart Greenhouse – Camera 2

Mushroom Tent

Vertical Farming Tower