“We’ve created a wearable sensor that monitors plant stress and disease in a noninvasive way by measuring the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted by plants,” said Qingshan Wei, co-corresponding author of a paper on the work.
Current methods of testing for plant stress or disease involve taking plant tissue samples and conducting tests on them in a lab. However, this only gives growers one measurement, and there is a time lag between when growers take a sample and when they get the test results.
Plants emit different combinations of VOCs under different circumstances. By targeting VOCs that are relevant to specific diseases or plant stress, the sensors can alert users to specific problems.
“Our technology monitors VOC emissions from the plant continuously, without harming the plant,” Wei said. “The prototype we’ve demonstrated stores this monitoring data, but future versions will transmit the data wirelessly. What we’ve developed allows growers...