Physical layer - used for information acquisition process. Information will be collected by means of sensors at
ground level, human work and two innovative systems: Multispectral Terrestrial Mobile Mechatronic System
(MTMMS) and Multispectral Autonomous Aerial Mobile Mechatronic System (MAAMMS). These two innovative
systems will provide a solution for farmers with limited financial possibilities for monitoring potato crop vegetation
condition based on multispectral investigation techniques. All measurements will be georeferenced using GPS
satellites and will contain information regarding the hydric and thermal stress, soil properties, level of chlorophyll,
pH, nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus, etc.
Network layer – wireless communication is an indispensable technology for precision agriculture (Luculescu et
al., 2014). The central element in such a network is the node (mote) and is the results of a complex hardware and
software integration design. Designing network nodes is not an easy task but in the proposed architecture the
information obtained from MTMMS and MAAMMS will be transmitted via an Acquisition, Processing, Storage and
Transmission System for Multispectral Information (APSTSMI), an innovative solution that provides the basic tool
for collecting data from the field. APSTSMI is a special system designed for being integrated with the two
mechatronic mobile systems and to provide the entire range of information required in decision layer.
Decision layer – optimal decisions will be obtained using an Innovative Technology for Multispectral Monitoring
of the Vegetation Status of Crops (ITMMVSC). This technology will use artificial intelligence techniques,
containing GIS elements on which agricultural information is overlapped, offering through a friendly user graphical
interface a valuable decisional tool in what means today precision potato crop management (Puiu et al., 2014). This
system will create, store, analyse and process spatial information distributed through a computerized process
regarding soil type, nutrient levels and correlate them with a certain plot of field. Moreover, will enable viewing,
understanding and interpreting data in many ways. In this way, by monitoring inputs and outputs of crop, farmers
will determine what areas of the field are profitable or not and what steps can be taken to increase profits in affected
areas.
Application layer - this layer will provide solutions to incoming problems based on information processed and
stored locally but also from knowledge bases obtained from other location where similar situations occurred. In this
way that farmers can follow the evolution of certain parameters of interest and take the appropriate decisions in
order to increase agricultural productivity.
It is expected that the proposed architecture to:
1) Increase the agricultural management with major economic impact;
2) Protect the environment and to preserve the natural resources in a more efficient manner;
3) Optimizing the use of water resources by careful monitoring the crop vegetation indices regarding the hydric
stress;
4) Obtain large and quality productions due to the integrated management system;
5) Optimizing the chemical inputs (fertilizer and pesticides) by knowing the right doses and moments when to be
used;
6) Increase the sustainability of agricultural systems;
7) Provide a low cost solution for the farmers with limited financial possibilities that can be easily implemented in
practice.