Water-volume measurement of plants by using itplanter

The itplanter is an indoor cultivation device which has LED light and pump controlled by PIC(Peripheral IC). The aero hydroponics cultivation method is adopted for the sake of foolproof, dirt-free, and easy control cultivation condition. Both the pump and the LED light of the itplanter can be controlled by PC through USB interface, and can be accessed to any sensors. When the itplanter connected to the Internet PC, this itplanter can be monitored and controlled through the Internet from another PC or smart-phone device. Since a lot of itplanter will construct a huge cloud-computing garden, researchers can get several information about plants growing, and they can get cultivation program for any plants, efficiently. Furthermore, the itplanter has some sensors, such as thermo sensor, photo sensor and water level sensor; change of environment can be measured and recorded automatically. Especially, water level sensor is non-contact type sensor and it can be used for measuring water-pump characteristics of plants through water-volume measurement of plants. We found that plants absorb water in short time period and decrease gradually in long time. In this paper, the itplanter is introduced and some water-volume measurement experiment results are reported.