Dennis Buckmaster

Dennis Buckmaster
Purdue University West Lafayette | Purdue · Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering

About

138
Publications
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Publications

Publications (138)
Preprint
One of the most intriguing 6G vertical markets is precision agriculture, where communications, sensing, control, and robotics technologies are used to improve agricultural outputs and decrease environmental impact. Ambient IoT (A-IoT), which uses a network of devices that harvest ambient energy to enable communications, is expected to play an impor...
Conference Paper
In IoT-based agricultural systems, precise real-time decisions are crucial. Data synergy strengthens model efficacy, and to leverage agricultural data-driven models, data flow, both for inputs and outputs, is necessary. Data from sensors, vehicles, UAVs, and other sources can be made interoperable by leveraging event-driven architecture in data tra...
Article
Full-text available
In the present era of agricultural digitalization, documenting on-farm operations is critical. These records contextualize other layers of data and underpin economic analysis and informed decision-making. On-farm recordkeeping is rooted in an ancient tradition and has evolved from pen and paper to digital means integrating diverse tools and methods...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
With unprecedented challenges to achieve sustainable crop productivity under climate change and varying soil conditions, adaptive management strategies are required for optimizing cropping systems. Using sensors, cropping systems can be continuously monitored and the data collected by them can be analyzed for making informed adaptive management dec...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Interoperability is one of the enabling factors of real-time communications and data exchange between asynchronous data actors. Interoperability can be attained by introducing the notion of events to systems that extract data from consumed ground-truth event streams that utilize application-specific structures. Events are specific occurrences happe...
Article
Full-text available
Subsurface soil moisture is a primary determinant for root development and nutrient transportation in the soil and affects the tractability of agricultural vehicles. A statistical forecasting model, Vector AutoRegression (VAR), and a Long Short-Term Memory network (LSTM) were developed to forecast the subsurface soil moisture at a 20 cm depth using...
Presentation
Increased temperatures and irregular precipitation patterns can severely affect corn growth and development, hence reduce the yield. Irrigation can help to provide a reliable and consistent source of water supply to maintain the optimal soil moisture at critical growth stages of corn, but overapplication of water can increase surface runoff and nit...
Conference Paper
Data are the foundation of digital agriculture. Data from a wide variety of sensors in the soil, in machinery, or from remote sensing can inform decisions including site-specific land and crop management but capitalizing on these data requires metadata that captures the full story related to production. Answers to metadata questions such as who, wh...
Conference Paper
Even with the rapid advancement in environmental and crop sensing and transmission of data, crop growth models could fill the analytical gap to enable real-time decision-making for improved profitability and environmental sustainability. An example of a complex management situation needing improved predictions is nitrogen rate and timing for corn (...
Poster
Full-text available
The study was to develop a smartphone app that can automatically record metadata of agricultural operations, The app, as geofence responsive, helps users to record the activity data in a validated input manner offered by an Infobot. Thus, the app keeps farm activity records with fewer errors and reduces the possibility of missing data. The app expo...
Article
Full-text available
The production of row crops in the Midwestern (Indiana) region of the US has been facing environmental and economic sustainability issues. There has been an increase in trend for the application of fertilizers (nitrogen & phosphorus), farm machinery fuel costs and decreasing labor productivity leading to non-optimized usage of farm inputs. Literatu...
Article
Highlights Context-driven yield data cleaning resulted in more accurate whole field yield estimates Using a context-driven yield data cleaning method can improve yield estimates for zones within fields Identifying error-prone areas in field where data quality is likely to be low and removing that data in bulk can reduce data cleaning bias Abstract...
Article
Highlights Proposed a novel methodology for fully automated, low-cost, and high-resolution harvest performance analyses. Described methods for estimating key features, such as the center of the header, using noisy positioning data. Introduced metrics Swath Utilization and Spatial Field Capacity to evaluate temporal and spatial performances. Provide...
Article
While telematics and edge computing in agriculture have evolved significantly over the past 30 years, the same fundamental problems of vendor lock-in and incompatibility remain. In this article, we introduce Avena, our new open source framework for building an ecosystem around agricultural edge computing that embraces data sovereignty while still e...
Article
Full-text available
Broadband access is key to ensuring robust economic development and improving quality of life. Unfortunately, the communication infrastructure deployed in rural areas throughout the world lags behind its urban counterparts due to low population density and economics. This article examines the motivations and challenges of providing broadband access...
Preprint
Broadband access is key to ensuring robust economic development and improving quality of life. Unfortunately, the communication infrastructure deployed in rural areas throughout the world lags behind its urban counterparts due to low population density and economics. This article examines the motivations and challenges of providing broadband access...
Article
Full-text available
The landscapes across much of the Midwestern United States are characterized by glacial activity that left water‐holding kettles, depressions, and potholes. Until recently, traditional watershed algorithms assumed these depressions to be errors in the elevation data and filled them as a means of correction, when many of these features may rarely fi...
Article
Full-text available
Digital agriculture, with the incorporation of Internet-of-Things (IoT)-devices, presents the ability to control a system at multiple levels and generate tools for improved decision making. Recent advances in IoT hardware and software make it possible to collect data and efficiently process data from diverse sources in a connected farm. By intercon...
Article
Full-text available
This paper introduces an open-source platform called ISOBlue HD for acquisition of context-rich data from agricultural machinery. We call these datasets context-rich, because they enable the identification of machine status and farming logistics by properly labeling, fusing, and processing the data. The system includes a single board computer, a ce...
Article
Full-text available
Modern precision agriculture equipment enables site-specific management by allowing different treatments for different parts of a field. This ability to subdivide the field calls for identifying management zones. A compromise between treating a field uniformly and treating every plant individually is needed, as the former does not maximize yields a...
Preprint
Full-text available
Digital agriculture has the promise to transform agricultural throughput. It can do this by applying data science and engineering for mapping input factors to crop throughput, while bounding the available resources. In addition, as the data volumes and varieties increase with the increase in sensor deployment in agricultural fields, data engineerin...
Article
With increasing concerns about food safety in many countries, product traceability has become an important risk-management tool. It enables the identification of possible sources of defective goods and facilitates the withdrawal and recall of affected products to protect consumers from foodborne diseases. However, it is troublesome for farmers to m...
Article
Crop and animal production techniques have changed significantly over the last century. In the early 1900s, animal power was replaced by tractor power that resulted in tremendous improvements in field productivity, which subsequently laid foundation for mechanized agriculture. While precision agriculture has enabled site-specific management of crop...
Article
The Internet of Things is a growing field of design and development in agriculture. In this article, we provide IoT researchers and practitioners a glimpse into the motivations, needs, and challenges faced when designing digital technologies for agriculture. We describe three farming scenarios and offer a vision for the power of IoT in agriculture,...
Article
A corn stover shredder using a flail type knife and tine shredding mechanism was designed, fabricated, and tested with the objective of improving the extent of shredding with corn stover. Leachate ion conductivity index represents access to plant nutrients and was used to indicate shredding effectiveness. Shredding was more effective (higher leacha...
Conference Paper
Recent interest in big data in agriculture has led to a demand for tools farmers can use to analyze past yield data to drive future decisions. While sophisticated statistical analysis has been used in the past to analyze comparative field trials, better capture and interpretation of descriptive metadata will be required to reap more benefit from cr...
Article
Recent changes in the agricultural equipment market have led to increased costs associated with tractor ownership and operation. A regression analysis produced a linear model for purchase price based on a tractor‘s power and configuration (fixed frame, articulated, tracked). Projected purchase price and other cost contributors including fuel, repai...
Conference Paper
The utilization of Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) technologies often requires modifications to vehicles and/or roadside infrastructure. However, in this paper, we investigate some special transportation cases, which we call Specialized Micro Transportation Systems (SMTS), and find the applications of information technologies for them promi...
Conference Paper
Recent interest in the realm of “big data” in agriculture has led to a demand for tools farmers can use to analyze past yield data to drive future decisions. While sophisticated statistical analysis has been used in the past to analyze comparative field trials, better capture and interpretation of descriptive metadata will be required to reap more...
Article
Full-text available
The objective of this experiment was to determine preservation characteristics of modified wet distillers grains with solubles (MWDGS) when stored with corn silage or feedstuffs having a traditionally marginal nutrient profile. Wet distillers grains with solubles (approximately 50% DM) were blended with either corn silage, corn stalks, soybean hull...
Article
Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the effect of feeding corn modified-wet distiller's grain plus solubles (MWDGS; 48% DM) co-ensiled with chopped whole plant corn (WC) on growth performance, dietary intake and nutrient digestibility of beef cattle. In experiment 1, ninety-six Angus-crossed heifers (two year-old; 522 ± 49.1 kg BW; 5.3 ± 0.1...
Article
Wireless sensor networks that monitor agricultural equipment can provide useful data to optimize a farm’s productivity. To become widely adopted, such a sensor network requires sensors with battery lives at least as long as a full farming season. The standard low power wireless sensor communication platforms, e.g. Zigbee and ANT, lack common hard...
Conference Paper
Record keeping needs tend to grow with the size of a farming operation, but so do the hurdles to maintaining good records. Many farmers recognize a need for record keeping techniques that grow with them. Unfortunately, there have traditionally been significant trade-offs between the work of achieving accurate, useful, and recallable records, and ad...
Conference Paper
As mobile devices improve, the possibility of bringing watershed management tasks typically performed in the office to the field can be realized. High-resolution digital elevation models that capture microtopographic features such as natural depressions, road embankments, and ditches further enable field-scale analyses to take place. A sequential d...
Conference Paper
An integrated tractor-implement model was developed in an upper level undergraduate/graduate level course. The model development and analysis takes 2-3 laboratory periods and provides a means of synthesizing engine, transmission, traction, ballasting, draft, and vehicle performance knowledge in a problems-solving context. The resulting model allows...
Conference Paper
Modern production agriculture is beginning to advance beyond deterministic, scheduled operations between relatively few people to larger scale, information-driven efficiency in order to respond to the challenges of field variability and meet the needs of a growing population. Since no two farms are the same with respect to information and managemen...
Conference Paper
A flailing knife shredder was designed and tested as an alternative to a hammermill for processing biomass. Energy usage, output characteristics and device capacities were compared with corn stover processed at moisture content (MC) of 10%, 35% and 50% wet basis. The hammermill produced a more uniform particle size distribution and with higher acce...
Article
Full-text available
Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the effects of feeding corn modified wet distillers grain plus solubles (MWDGS) co-ensiled with direct-cut forage (DC) to beef steers, on feedlot performance and total tract digestibility. In Exp. 1, sixty-four crossbred Angus steers (n = 64; 329 ± 43 kg) were blocked by BW and randomly assigned to 1 of 4...
Conference Paper
A system was designed and tested to measure pressure in the airbag suspension components of an over-the-road tractor trailer and use those signals to wirelessly display load weight. Three subcomponents (a HID -- human interface device and two DPUs -- digital processing units) were required and communicated using Zigbee wireless devices. Except for...
Conference Paper
Condensed Distillers Solubles (CDS) and corn stover mixed at a 3:1 or 2:1 ratio has been shown to have potential as a competitive feedstuff for beef and dairy cattle producers. Through lab scale silo tests, the aerobic stability, pH, mold and nutrient values suggest that these blends can partially replace corn silage. Cost projections were modeled...
Conference Paper
A machine was designed to separate the rind, pith, and leaves of corn stalk stalks with capacity of approximately 550 kg/h. To reasonably optimize variables of the machine operation, experiments were performed to evaluate leaf stripping and pith stripping effectiveness which was expressed as percentage. Leaf stripping was most effective with high s...
Article
The effects of dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) and crude glycerin on performance, carcass, and metabolic parameters in early weaned (EW) beef calves were assessed. Fifty EW Anguscross calves (123 d of age; 170 kg of BW) were blocked by BW and randomly assigned to 1 of 5 dietary treatments: 1) haylage-based control (NEG), 2) corn-based...
Article
Full-text available
To remain competitive in the industry, beef and dairy producers in the Midwest need to adapt to the use of alternative feeds and take advantage of the expected abundance and favorable pricing of biofuel coproducts. Integrating the coproducts as feed ingredients could make the livestock industry significantly more attractive and competitive in domes...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Student motivation is one of the most important components of learning in both formal and informal settings. Some students are naturally motivated to learn; others need inspiration and stimulation. The authors surveyed 163 students in seven agriculture courses taught by five different instructors to ask what motivated them and what strategies could...
Conference Paper
Fresh rice straw silage was made in Heilongjiang China through baling and chopping. Three kinds of feed rolls were tested in the steel-roll baler. Effects of feed roll type on density and plugging was evaluated. Harvest of fresh rice straw and storing it as silage is practical. The round steel-roll baler equipped with an angled slicing disc feeding...
Conference Paper
Whole shelled corn, black beans, white beans, and fuzzy whole cotton seed were used as tracers in blended total mixed rations to assess uniformity. Tracers were placed in varied locations of the mixer, but tracer placement did not affect the coefficient of variation (CV; the uniformity measurement). With a paddle mixer and a beef ration which did n...
Conference Paper
Parker Hannifin’s IQAN electro-hydraulic control system was installed on four hydraulic trainers to be used for hands-on lab instruction. Each Parker IQAN system includes a MD3 display/controller, XA2 expansion interface module, and ICL joystick. The updated trainers will be used to teach students about mobile Controller Area Network (CAN) systems,...
Article
For resolving harvesting technology of fresh rice straw silage and plugging of the round steel-roll baler in China, experimental researches were made in the paper. For harvesting technology, baling silage and chopping silage were experimented. For the round baler, three kinds of feeding rolls equipped for enhancing feeding capability were experimen...
Article
An infinitely variable transmission (IVT) for instructional purposes was designed and built. It was an input-coupled power split transmission with a hydrostatic transmission used as the variable unit. The IVT cart was built to connect to a dynamometer for output power, torque, and speed measurement. With instrumentation for input torque and speed a...
Article
Full-text available
A plastic-derived fuel production process was developed and has been shown to be effective for non-recyclable plastics that are widely used in agriculture and normally discarded. A machine was designed, constructed, and evaluated with regard to energy balance and fuel nugget production. The hydraulically driven machine processed dirty, non-recyclab...
Conference Paper
In-furrow application of granular insecticides in corn provides root zone protection against insects including corn root worm, wire worms, cutworms, white grubs and others. Traditional granular application methods dispense a uniform application of pesticide over the entire length of the furrow. A seed-specific granular pesticide application system...
Conference Paper
In a first year Agricultural Systems Computations and Communications course, students are required to prepare and deliver a demonstration of skills, tools, or software features related to course content. These formal presentations are delivered in a virtual meeting room and recorded live during a laboratory period so that students in other sections...
Article
Full-text available
During forage harvest for silage, the harvesters, transport units, and equipment at the storage site (blower, bagger, or bunker packing) must work at a similar rate to avoid idle equipment and labor. Harvester power (which determines potential harvester capacity) was used as a basis for sizing transport and unloading equipment and their power units...
Article
During forage harvest for silage, the harvesters, transport units, and equipment at the storage site (blower, bagger, or bunker packing) must work at a similar rate to avoid idle equipment and labor. Harvester power (which determines potential harvester capacity) was used as a basis for sizing transport and unloading equipment and their power units...
Article
Full-text available
Electrolytic ion leakage is proposed as a method to assess activity access for subsequent biological or chemical processing of forage or biomass. Smaller particle sizes and subsequent processing, which increased surface area, resulted in higher leachate ion conductivity measures. Use of ion conductivity readings to compare harvest or processing tre...
Conference Paper
Switchgrass has been promoted as a potential biomass crop and a promising source for renewable energy. In contrast to many traditional forage crops, switchgrass is typically managed with a single fall harvest rather than several harvests throughout the growing season. A single-harvest switchgrass crop was compared to a three-harvest tall fescue cro...
Conference Paper
Learner motivation is one of the most important components of learning in all formal and informal settings. Some students naturally seem motivated to learn; others need inspiration and stimulation. Motivation falls into two basic categories: extrinsic and intrinsic. Extrinsic motivation comes from a person’s environment. Extrinsic motivations are i...
Article
Wet distiller's grains with solubles (WDGS; nominally 50% moisture) was blended with corn silage, corn stalks, soyhulls, and wheat straw and stored as silage (approximately 65% moisture and in an anaerobic environment) in lab scale silos. The resulting feed resource was stable, having a final pH near or below 4.0 which significantly slows or inhibi...
Article
Full-text available
A machine capable of placing planting holes for a wide variety of spacings in plastic mulch beds with very little physical reconfiguration was designed and tested. The three-point hitch mounted machine was demonstrated with two horticultural crops which have widely varying within-row and between-row spacing requirements: onions and potatoes. The pi...
Conference Paper
A topic grid with topics (course subject matter) in rows and courses in columns can help communicate curricular content. Topic grids were used through the curricular refinement process at two institutions. Generation of the matrix helps clarify the curriculum and interactions among courses. A few matrix coding possibilities are presented in this pa...
Article
Full-text available
This study investigated differences in learning styles and personality types among engineering students, agricultural systems management students, and faculty in the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at Pennsylvania State University. Learning styles and personality types were evaluated using the Group Embedded Figures Test (GEFT...
Conference Paper
During forage harvest for silage, a harvester(s), transport units, and storage site (blower, bagger, or bunker packing) must work together; capacity of these individual machines need to be reasonably matched. Harvester power (which controls harvester capacity) was used as a basis from which other equipment and power units may be sized. Cycle analys...
Article
Full-text available
Nearly all tractor PTO arrangements used today consist of a rotating mechanical shaft with two or more universal joints. This arrangement continues to be an entanglement hazard. By driving the attachment with fluid power, this hazard could be eliminated. This project included the design, development, and testing of an experimental tractor based on...
Article
Cycle diagrams are relatively simple tools that can provide insight concerning the interaction of equipment and operational changes on dynamic agricultural systems. However, they are tedious to generate by hand which makes it time consuming to compare system alternatives. Cycle analysis principles were implemented in a spreadsheet so machine and sy...
Article
Full-text available
A beef herd submodel was created for integration with other farm components to form a whole-farm model capable of simulating a wide range of beef production systems. This herd submodel determined the best available feed or feed mix to meet the fiber, energy, and protein requirements for each of up to six animal groups on the farm. The groups compri...
Article
A low-cost dryer was developed to dry forage or biomass samples unattended in 20 to 60 minutes. The simple dryer is built from readily available plumbing and heating supplies; the heat and airflow source is a hair blow dryer. Based on data from hay, hay crop silage, and corn silage samples ranging in moisture from 12 to 70%, the vortex dryer dried...
Conference Paper
A corn silage-shredding harvester was modified to improve crop throughput. A new spout was constructed and several components were added throughout the harvester. A corn field was harvested using the shredding harvester and a corn chopper. Three treatments of corn silage were collected: shredded (SCS), 0.008 m (0.313 in) theoretical length of cut (...
Conference Paper
A model including interactions of harvest, transport, and storage functions of a system for gathering large amounts of biomass for use in production agriculture or the biomass refining industry was refined to include a harvester power/capacity relationship. Harvester capacity (Mg/h, tons/h) was estimated as harvester power (kW or hp) divided by a c...
Conference Paper
The Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering at Penn State began offering an Off-Road Equipment (OFFRD) Minor in 2002. This manuscript reviews the rationale for the minor, the content of the minor, and the impact on students and course enrollments. With 34 enrolled in the minor in 2 ½ years, the formation of the minor has increased exp...