309: Automated Aquaponic Farm

As the climate changes and demand for food increases, we need modern approaches to farming. Our goal was to make an automated aquaponic farming system that uses Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) technology to track the plants grown in a small farm bed. A LiDAR sensor uses the pulse from a laser to create 3D models and maps of the objects around it.

We wanted to use this technology to measure and track the growth of plants in an aquaponic farm. We combined the VLP-16 LiDAR sensor with a Genesis farming robot tool called FarmBot that moves the camera around a planted area to take daily measurements. After collecting the data, we designed a system using Google Cloud and Python to store the data from the farm for future reference. We also used the data to make graphs of plant growth over time. In the future, this project could be scaled up to use in commercial farms to determine what plants are growing and track plant growth rate compared to previous seasons.