With the development of industrial agricultural techniques, incorporating pesticides and genetically modified crops, humankind experienced significant growth in our food production. Now, vertical gardens offer us another possible food revolution, one boosted by innovations among silicon wafer manufacturers.
In a world that’s running out of space, vertical gardens maximize limited spaces, offering food security to urban areas and small, highly populated countries. Advances in computing technology and Artificial Intelligence may be the push needed to make them even more efficient.
The idea of vertical gardens originated from a series of problems. As cities grow, available land decreases. And so do the hands that foster the process, as major metropolitan centers experience a constant influx of people from the countryside.
So, their food intake grows while production is progressively decreasing.
To satisfy urban areas, agriculture needed to find a way to make the most of available resources. The goal was to mitigate issues such as food scarcity, climate change, and logistics issues caused by the great distance between the centers of food production and consumption.
Because of that, they incorporated cutting-edge technologies that aim to optimize the food production process. And the solution was developing vertical gardens.
The technology behind vertical gardens is based on:
The towers or racks where plants are set in a stacked manner to grow. This helps maximize space usage.
Smart Vertical Gardens employ automated hydroponics and aeroponics systems that control the precise amount of water and nutrients delivered directly to the plant’s roots, ensuring optimal growth.
Particularly in indoor vertical farming, energy-efficient LED lighting systems are used to provide the light spectrum and intensity required for plant growth.
A groundbreaking aspect of vertical farming is how it incorporates automated analysis systems to control the garden’s environmental factors and optimize plant growth. Elements like lighting, temperature, and humidity are all measured with sensors to monitor the plant’s growth. By setting up a series of parameters, farmers can make real-time adjustments to their nutrients, water, and lighting provisions in real time.
Each of these processes needs to work in perfect synchronization, ensuring that data monitoring and automation are working every step of the way.
Because of that, computing technology plays a very important role in vertical gardens.
The Internet of Things (IoT) consists of a network of physical devices. By connecting various physical objects to each other through the Internet, they can work together in a synchronized manner, exchanging data, and optimizing processes.
Moreover, IoT devices can be equipped with sensors to collect data from their surroundings. This is crucial for monitoring plant growth. IoT technologies enable remote monitoring and control of gardens from anywhere, providing convenience and flexibility.
Remote monitoring also means remote management. For example, computing technology makes it possible to establish automated irrigation frameworks that are scheduled to apply water at pre-determined periods and for a certain timeframe.
This can be used to control water usage, a very valuable feat in places with water scarcity. That’s one of the reasons why vertical farming systems were designed, as they focus on using little water and reusing it as much as possible.
Moreover, artificial intelligence and machine learning have been incorporated into optimizing plant growth conditions: AI and machine learning algorithms can analyze data and make intelligent decisions, modifying factors such as lighting, temperature, and nutrient delivery for optimal plant growth.
Semiconductors such as silicon wafers can be used in the production of both chips and microchips in electronic devices needed to power vertical farms.
Especially because of the uniqueness of the electrical currents via silicon wafers, they are necessary for creating ICs (integrated circuits). The ICs act as commands for specific actions in various electronic devices, which is crucial to the Internet of Things (IoT).
Integrated circuits consist of a variety of electronic elements brought together to perform a particular function, and silicon wafers are their key component. Wafers are thin slices of a semiconductor material that act as a substratum for microelectronic devices fitted in and above the wafer.
As you can see, silicon wafers offer the canvas on which to fabricate the integrated circuitry central to all electronics. They are used in computers, smartphones, mobile devices, and vertical gardening! Some of the usages most deeply related to gardening are:
However, this is not all. Advancements in wafer manufacturing expand the possibilities for vertical gardening.
For example, ultra-flat wafers can be used for scanning surfaces and creating high-resolution topographic images, which could be used to analyze the surface of crops and identify—and prevent—plagues.
Additionally, ultra-flat wafers are being used in biological applications that include thin-film research, which could offer many valuable developments to vertical farming in the coming years.
These are just some ideas. The future is yet unknown, but research and investigation around these topics could help bring vertical farming to a more industrial level, making it a real, dependable resource for cities all across the globe.
Smart vertical farms utilizing computing technologies and the Internet of Things (IoT) have the power to revolutionize modern gardening practices. Here at Wafer World, watching these changes, and thinking of how we can also contribute to growth, is very exciting.
Wafers are a crucial element in today’s society.
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