MICROPROCESSOR-BASED AGRI INSTRUMENTATION

Book excerpt: This book provides the fundamental concepts of system design using microprocessors in the field of agriculture instrumentation. It begins with an introduction to the field of agriculture and application of instrumentation in agriculture, and the book then covers the transducers specific to the agricultural field. The binary number system and arithmetic are covered as the basic building block of digital circuits and computer organization. The microprocessor basics and Intel 8085 hardware and software have been discussed in detail. The book describes microprocessor peripheral inter-facing and its support chips such as Intel 8225, Intel 8253 and Intel 8279 along with their applications. It discusses analog to digital and digital to analog interface, CRT terminal interface and printer interface. In addition, the book includes case studies on various microprocessor applications in agriculture, such as microprocessor-based system design for grain moisture, safe grain storage, soil nutrient estimation and drip irrigation. Finally, the book ends with an advanced and futuristic topic on precision agriculture to give an exposure to students about future developments in the agricultural system. Key Features : • From concepts to design, the book follows a step-by-step approach. • Gives a large number of figures for easy understanding of theory. • Includes a good number of examples and end-of-chapter exercises both in the hardware and software sections. • Presents a number of case studies on the design of microprocessor-based agri-instrumentation systems. • Offers exercises on the case studies which can be used for further development of the concepts. The book is primarily intended for the undergraduate and postgraduate students of agricultural engineering for their courses on agri instrumen-tation and microprocessor applications in agriculture.