A paper on ” COMMON-Sense Net: Improved Water Management for Resource-Poor Farmers via Sensor Networks”, by Jacques Panchard, Seshagiri Rao, Prabhakar T.V, H.S. Jamadagni and Jean-Pierre Hubaux, will be presented at the ICTD 2006 conference in Berkeley, USA, May 25 and 26 2006, in the ICT for Agriculture track. The paper describes the on-going design and implementation of a sensor network for agricultural management targeted at resource-poor farmers in India.

The paper is available here, in the COMMON-Sense Net website.

By Warren Webb, Technical Editor — EDN, 5/9/2006

Claiming to offer the modern replacement for the venerable strip-chart recorder, Accsense recently introduced a wireless-sensor system that measures a wide range of physical properties and delivers real-time data to any Web-enabled device. The company based the system on wireless-sensor Pods that measure ambient temperature, humidity, light, noise, and vibration and automatically form a secure, self-healing wireless-mesh network with a range as long as 4000 ft. Accsense sensor Pods are compatible with a range of standard external plug-in sensors and probes, including thermocouples, resistance-temperature detectors, and thermistors.

A complete Accsense system includes as many as 16 wireless-sensor Pods, a Pod Gateway for connecting the sensor network to the Internet, and an online account for monitoring, storing, and analyzing data. Sensor Pods range in price from $295 to $635, depending on the combination of measurements and number of inputs. The Pod Gateway sells for $795 and supports as many as 16 pods. The Accsense-hosted online service is available through a monthly subscription. The Standard Account is free and enables users to monitor their data online and download it for deeper analysis. At $24.95 per month, the Premium Account offers additional features, such as analytical charting and alarms that send alerts to cell phones, pagers, and e-mail if measurements fall out of range.

More available here.

China starts project on lunar probe

A key project of China’s Natural Science Funds, “Research of fundamental theory and key technology for modeling, sensoring, navigation and control of the lunar probe system” was inaugurated in Institute of Intelligent Machines, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

Aiming to develop the positioning and navigation system for the lunar probe, the project sets forth the computation of the control of soft landing of the lunar explorer, positioning and navigation system based on electronic, light and force sensors and wireless sensor network technology, and two-level control strategy comprising remote control and regional self-control.

More available here.