Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632

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Agricultural Water Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/agwat

Research paper

Development of smart irrigation systems based on real-time soil moisture

data in a greenhouse: Proof of concept
Renkuan Liao b, 1, Shirui Zhang a, c, 1, Xin Zhang a, c, Mingfei Wang a, c, Huarui Wu a, c, *,
Lili Zhangzhong a, c, *
a
National Engineering Research Center for Information Technology in Agriculture, Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, Beijing 100097, China
b
Department of Biological & Environmental Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853, United States
c
Key Laboratory for Quality Testing of Software and Hardware Products on Agricultural Information, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Beijing 100097, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Handling Editor - Dr. N. Jovanovic A reasonable estimation of crop water uptake depth (WUD) provides vital prerequisites for determining scientific
irrigation scheduling. However, real-time acquisition of crop WUD to guide irrigation has not been reported. In
Keywords: the current study, a smart irrigation system based on real-time soil moisture data was developed, in which the
Water-saving irrigation dynamic crop WUD was estimated using the spatiotemporal characteristics of soil moisture distributions. Sub­
Automatic irrigation
sequently, the data of crop WUD were acquired using a central irrigation controller to achieve a precise irrigation
Water uptake
depth at each irrigation event. A drip irrigation experiment for tomato (Lycopersicum esculentum) planting was
Greenhouse
Tomato conducted in a greenhouse in northern China. Wireless soil moisture sensors were installed to collect real-time
Remote control soil moisture data from a 0–100 cm soil profile. Soil moisture exhibited a ladder trend for 0–60 cm and a stable
trend for 60–100 cm. A regression equation (WUDi = − 0.0119d2 + 1.9387d - 6.5795, R2 = 0.89) quantifying the
dynamic depth of crop water uptake was successfully obtained based on the characteristics of soil moisture
distribution, and a water-saving scheme (i.e., irrigation to real-time crop WUD) was determined to guide every
irrigation event via a remote automatic irrigation system. Tomato evapotranspiration (ET) calculated using soil
moisture data was consistent with that calculated using indoor meteorological data, confirming the reliability of
real-time soil moisture data for estimating the tomato WUD. The tomato irrigation water use efficiency (IWUE) of
the established system reached 41.23 kg/m3, which was an evident improvement compared with that obtained
using a traditional irrigation scheme (31.58 kg/m3). In addition, the IWUE of tomato in the established system
was almost approached that of the previously published results. The findings of this study highlight the
importance of reasonable water-saving irrigation scheduling and provide insights into the development of an
efficient and automatic irrigation system.

1. Introduction has considerably increased water resources requirements (Frisvold and

The sustainable development of irrigated farming has been chal­
lenged by the increase in water resource shortages (Chen et al., 2019;
Freire-González et al., 2017). Further, global warming and the frequent
occurrences of extreme climates have escalated the severity of this sit­
uation(Guo and Shen, 2016; Henley et al., 2019; Knežević et al., 2018;
Todorovic, 2018). Meanwhile, with the rapid development of the global
economy and large-scale population migration from the countryside to
the city, the inevitable acceleration of industrialization and urbanization
Konyar, 2012; Piao et al., 2010; Xu et al., 2020). Increasing industrial
and urban water supply by reducing agricultural water use has gradually
been recognized as an acceptable solution because approximately 70%
of water withdrawals and more than 80% of water consumption origi­
nate from agricultural irrigation (Jägermeyr et al., 2015). However,
population growth in turn demands the sustained growth of food pro­
duction in the future, which necessitates water inputs that can support
irrigated agriculture. Although the application of desalinated seawater
and reclaimed water can facilitate agricultural irrigation, the high cost

* Corresponding authors at: National Engineering Research Center for Information Technology in Agriculture, Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sci­
ences, Beijing 100097, China
E-mail addresses: wuhr@nercita.org.cn (H. Wu), lilizhangzhong@163.com (L. Zhangzhong).
1
Renkuan Liao and Shirui Zhang contributed equally to this work

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agwat.2020.106632
Received 22 May 2020; Received in revised form 24 September 2020; Accepted 5 November 2020
Available online 23 November 2020
0378-3774/© 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
R. Liao et al.
of desalination and the safety risk of reclaimed water hinder these irri­
gation applications (Gonzales-Gustavson et al., 2019; Martínez-Alvarez
et al., 2016; Ventura et al., 2019; Wang et al., 2017). Therefore, we
should strive to ensure adequate food production by reducing irrigation
water inputs.
Efficient water-saving irrigation schemes provide alternative op­
portunities to address this challenge (Albasha et al., 2016; Bell, 2014; Du
et al., 2008a; Li, 2017; Schiattone et al., 2018; Schwartz et al., 2019).
With these schemes, owing to the considerably improved water-use ef­
ficiency of crops, the yield of crops is guaranteed even if irrigation water
is insufficient. Numerous extant studies have confirmed the effective­
ness of using water-saving irrigation schemes for improving crop pro­
duction with limited irrigation water inputs (Bell et al., 2020; Cantore
et al., 2016; Capra et al., 2008; Du et al., 2015; Gajić et al., 2018; Li,
2018; Shi et al., 2020). The theoretical basis for efficient water-saving
schemes is to enhance irrigation water-use efficiency (IWUE) through
flexible and planned irrigation modes, such as partial rootzone drying
and regulated deficit irrigation. The most significant advantage of these
irrigation modes over traditional full irrigation is that they improve the
soil water uptake performance of crop roots (Capra et al., 2011; Du et al.,
2006, 2008b; Giuliani et al., 2017; Mary et al., 2019; Stagno et al.,
2015). Theoretically, the increased water uptake performance of crop
roots is attributed to enhanced fine root development and regulated leaf
stomatal conductance, which are observed owing to the accumulation of
root and leaf ABA when partial roots are exposed to severe soil drying
(Pérez-Pérez et al., 2018; Wang et al., 2019).
The aforementioned efficient irrigation schemes considerably help
improve the water-use efficiency of crops, particularly in areas with
water shortage and lack of automatic irrigation facilities; however, the
development of these irrigation schemes requires complete consider­
ation of the physiological water requirements of crops at different
growth stages, rendering it difficult to formulate these schemes (Bell
et al., 2018; Benjamin et al., 2015; Campi et al., 2019; Tari, 2016).
Furthermore, mastering the specialized knowledge required is difficult
for farmers. Several recent efforts to develop smart or intelligent irri­
gation systems have helped considerably improve the IWUE of crops and
reduced the requirements of farmers’ professional knowledge (Ai-Gho­
bari and Marazky, 2014; Al-Ghobari et al., 2013; Cancela et al., 2015;
Contreras et al., 2017; Masseroni et al., 2018; O’Shaughnessy et al.,
2016; Osroosh et al., 2015; Rodriguez-Ortega et al., 2017). These ad­
vantages include labor cost effectiveness, water saving, flexible irriga­
tion schemes, and easy controllability of irrigation. Recently, Osroosh
et al. (2015) developed an automated irrigation system based on an
adaptive control algorithm to optimize the crop water stress index,
enabling the efficient water-saving irrigation scheduling of apple trees.
Further, Contreras et al. (2017) established an automatic irrigation
system using electronic tensiometers, in which the soil matric potential
of − 25 kPa was determined to obtain a commercial greenhouse zucchini
yield of 15 kg/m2. Using an automatic irrigation system, Rodrigue­
z-Ortega et al. (2017) evaluated the effects of different temperatures on
greenhouse tomato growth to suggest an optimal irrigation strategy for
improving the IWUE. Evidently, the development of an automatic irri­
gation system combined with an efficient irrigation scheme can
remarkably influence irrigated farming.
Quantifying the dynamic variations of water uptake depth (WUD)
during the growth period of crops is critical to accurately determine the
designed irrigation depth in a water-saving irrigation event (Cai et al.,
2018; Liao et al., 2018; Yadav and Mathur, 2008). Irrigation performed
at a reasonable designed irrigation depth can effectively avoid under- or
over-irrigation. In previous studies, the designed irrigation depth was
often empirically determined based on the crop variety and growth
period, in which the designed depth typically remains constant during
different growth periods. In fact, the root of the crop grows constantly,
and the empirical simplification of the designed irrigation depth is
inconsistent with the real growth rule of crops. Even in the same growth
period, the root length is as dynamic as the crop growth, resulting in
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Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632
dynamic changes in the crop WUD of the root. Therefore, it may be
feasible and promising to ensure high IWUE via optimizing irrigation
decision schemes, e.g., performing precise irrigation according to the
dynamic crop WUD, to achieve stabilized crop yield with reduced irri­
gation volume.
In this study, we used real-time soil moisture data to estimate the
dynamic crop WUD for guiding irrigation events, where the entire pro­
cess was controlled remotely by an automatic irrigation system. Tomato
(Lycopersicum esculentum), a globally important greenhouse economic
crop, was selected as the research object to verify the reliability of the
established system. The objectives of this study were to 1) propose a
water-saving irrigation decision scheme in which the dynamic tomato
WUD was used as the depth threshold of every irrigation event to avoid
under- or over-irrigation; 2) develop a smart irrigation system that
automatically collected real-time data and controlled every irrigation
event following the irrigation decision scheme. The significance of this
study is the real-time prediction of the dynamic WUD of roots and pre­
cise irrigation through an automatic irrigation system, which renders
the irrigation operation easier for farmers and provides a novel direction
for the development of irrigated agriculture.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Study site and experimental treatments
We conducted a study in a tomato greenhouse (30.5 m × 15 m) in
Xiaotangshan, Beijing, China (Fig. 1a), where the local average annual
temperature is 10–13 ◦ C, daily average sunshine hours are 6.5–8.5 h,
frost-free period is approximately 186–200 d, and annual average
rainfall is 602.2 mm. The south of the greenhouse was covered with
transparent plastic film, and the north was built with an insulation wall.
The transparent plastic film was equipped with an air inlet and a top
window, which were controlled via a motor to ventilate the greenhouse
and adjust the temperature and humidity. In addition, the greenhouse
was equipped with sunshade, which can be used to vary the amount of
light in the greenhouse. The indoor meteorological data of the green­
house were automatically recorded by a weather station (WS1800,
Nertica, China). The average temperature and air humidity in the
greenhouse were 25.6 ◦ C and 63.9%, respectively, during the experi­
ment. The field soil (0–80 cm) in the greenhouse was classified as loam
soil (based on USDA Soil Taxonomy) with a Kjeldahl N of 1.32 g/kg,
Olesen P of 54.53 mg/kg, available K of 117.5 mg/kg, EC of 31.88 mS/
m, pH of 7.8, volumetric field capacity of 30.8%, and soil density of 1.40
g/cm3. The chemical properties of soil were determined following the
procedures described in the Handbook of Soil Agrochemical Analysis
(Bao, 2000).
In the perennial rotation of tomato and cucumber crop cycles, a
plastic-film-covered “Jiaxina” tomato (Lycopersicum esculentum) drip
irrigation experiment controlled by an automatic irrigation system was
conducted from April 2017 to July 2017. The greenhouse was parti­
tioned equally into three plots, each of which comprised six ridges (area
of 24 m2, length of 10 m, and width of 2.4 m for each). Tomato was
planted via a local traditional manner (i.e., narrow-wide rows cultiva­
tion), in which the width of the ridge shoulder was 0.70 m and its height
was 0.20 m; further, the spacing between the narrow rows was 0.50 m,
and that between the wide rows was 0.70 m (Fig. 1b). Two rows of to­
matoes were planted per ridge, with a spacing of 0.30 m. Drip irrigation
was applied to supply water, where the drip belt was laid near the to­
mato root area along the length of the plot, and each drip belt irrigated
one row of tomato. The emitters were of the non-pressure-compensating
plated-type with a flow rate of 0.95 L/h and a spacing of 0.3 m on the
laterals. The operating pressure of the drip irrigation was 0.1 MPa, and
the irrigation water was filtered by a disc and screen filters. Each plot
was equipped with a wireless valve control node and data acquisition
node to control the irrigation events (Fig. 1c). A central irrigating
controller was installed to process all the data collected and send the
R. Liao et al.
Fig. 1. Location and layout of tomato irrigation experiment. a) Location of study site for greenhouse tomato irrigation experiment. b) Tomato planting mode. c)
Profile moisture sensor. d) Central irrigating controller. The greenhouse in the red box is the experimental greenhouse, and the reservoir in the blue box is the source
of irrigation water for the automatic irrigation experiment. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web
version of this article.)
irrigation orders (Fig. 1d). Each irrigation volume was measured using
an ultrasonic flow meter (diameter of φ2.5, resolution of 0.1 L, and
accuracy of 1%). In the first field plot, multiple-layer soil moisture data
of 0–20, 20–40, 40–60, and 60–80 cm were automatically collected
using a 100-cm-long wireless profile moisture sensor (TMH-2000,
China) to obtain real-time soil moisture distributions, enabling the
estimation of the dynamic tomato WUD. In this treatment, the initial
designed irrigation depth was set to 20 cm, i.e., the irrigation event was
conducted when the soil moisture at a depth of 20 cm reached the lower
limit of the soil moisture (70% of the field water capacity). The irriga­
tion volume for each irrigation event was calculated using Eqs. (1) and
(2), which will be described in detail later. In the subsequent irrigation
events, the tomato WUD was pre-estimated based on real-time soil
moisture data to obtain the dynamic designed irrigation depth for
guiding every irrigation event. The second plot was set as an isolated
zone to separate the experimental and control groups. The third plot was
equipped with a single-layer soil moisture sensor (STM-100, Nercita,
China) at a constant designed irrigation depth of 50 cm, which was set as
the control group. For the treatment and control groups, the irrigation
scheduling methods were different; however, the other agronomic
management measures of tomato were the same.
2.2. Water-saving irrigation scheduling
In this study, real-time soil moisture data were collected to estimate
the dynamic crop WUD, and a smart and precise irrigation scheme was
achieved by supplying water to the crop WUD, threby avoiding under- or
over-irrigation. The proposed irrigation decision scheme relies on the
available soil moisture theory (i.e., only the soil available water can be
effectively utilized by crops). The designed irrigation depth for each
irrigation event was quantified using Eq. (1), and the associated irriga­
tion volume was calculated using Eq. (2). To ensure an available soil
moisture condition, 90% and 70% of the field water capacity was set as
3
Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632
the upper limit and the lower limit of each irrigation, respectively.
z = WUDi (1)
where z is the designed irrigation depth (cm); WUDi is the dynamic crop
WUD estimated from the real-time soil moisture data at the ith irrigation
event (cm), which is determined by calculating the consumption rate of
moisture in this soil profile over a period of time. For instance, when the
soil moisture at the designed irrigation depth (in this study, the initial
designed irrigation depth was set as 20 cm) reached the lower limit of
soil moisture at time t, a conditional equation, i.e., (θtmax-θt)/T ≥ 0.01%,
was employed to estimate the crop WUD using the collected real-time
soil moisture data for depths in the range of 0–80 cm, where θt is the
soil moisture distributions for depths 0–20, 20–40, 40–60, and
60–80 cm at time t—when the irrigation events should be conducted;
θtmax is the maximum soil moisture distributions for depths 0–20, 20–40,
40–60, and 60–80 cm after the last irrigation event; and T is the time
elapsed (h) from tmax to t. The threshold of 0.01% was determined by
the test resolution of the moisture sensor we used. This threshold may
need to be adjusted if other moisture sensors used. The conditional
equation means that when the water uptake rate per hour between θtmax
and θt at a certain soil depth is greater than 0.01%, then the cropWUD
can be considered as to have reached this specific soil depth.
More details regarding the irrigation decision scheme in this study
are as follows: If the conditional equation (θtmax θt)/T ≥ 0.01% holds for
any specific soil depth (e.g., 20 cm), this specific depth is regarded as the
crop WUD, i.e., WUDi = 20 cm. If more than one depth satisfies the
conditional equation, the deepest depth is set as the crop WUD, e.g., if
the conditional equation holds both at 20, 40 and 60 cm, then 60 cm will
be set as the crop WUD, i.e., WUDi = 60 cm. All the real-time data were
collected using wireless profile moisture sensors, and the conditional
equation was validated using the central irrigating controller. Hence, we
can estimate the tomato WUD to determine the dynamic designed
R. Liao et al.
irrigation depth in real-time, enabling precise irrigation.
The volume for each irrigation event was calculated as follows:
I = 0.1 zγp(θmax –θmin )/η (2)
where I is the irrigation volume (mm); z is the designed irrigation depth
(cm), z = WUDi (cm); γ is the soil density (g/cm3); p is the percentage of
wetted soil area (%) that is based on the emitters outflow rates, drip lines
lay out, and soil characteristics, which was set as 60% in this study; θmax
and θmin are the upper and lower limits of each irrigation event (%),
respectively, i.e., the irrigation event is performed when the soil mois­
ture at the designed irrigation depth is reduced to θmin, and the soil
moisture at the designed irrigation depth is expected to be θmax after
irrigation; and η is the coefficient of drip irrigation water utilization,
which was 0.95 in this study.
2.3. Automatic irrigation system
The automatic irrigation system comprises a central irrigation
controller, wireless sensor nodes, wireless control nodes, an irrigation
system server, and a remote irrigation monitoring app, in which each
component unit was arranged appropriately to ensure the timely, effi­
cient, and intelligent management of irrigation events (Fig. 2). The
wireless profile moisture sensor nodes installed in the field first collected
the real-time soil moisture data, and the collected data were transmitted
to the central irrigation controller for evaluating the opportunity for
irrigation. When the soil moisture reaches the designed lower limit, the
central irrigation controller sends a reminder message to the user via the
mobile app. In the mobile app, users can remotely perform an irrigation
event through the wireless control nodes installed in the field. In each
irrigation event, the irrigation volume is determined by the built-in
water-saving irrigation decision scheme; in other words, the irrigation
volume is automatically calculated by the central irrigation controller,
as per Eq. (2). Furthermore, the irrigation system server can record all
these details, and its data-sharing capability enables a visual manage­
ment via the mobile app. Hence, users can monitor and manage the
entire irrigation process through a smartphone, which adapts to the fact
that people engaged in agricultural production in the future can use a
Fig. 2. Layout of automatic irrigation system and illustration of workflow procedure.
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Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632
smartphone skillfully. A logic diagram is shown below to illustrate the
entire irrigation procedure (Fig. 3).
2.4. Crop evapotranspiration(ETc), yield and IWUEy
In this study, ETc (mm/d) was calculated based on indoor meteoro­
logical (IM) data of greenhouse and soil moisture data, separately. To
calculate the indoor-meteorological-data-based ETc (IM ETc) using
greenhouse IM data, the single crop coefficient suggested by FAO 56 was
employed (Allen et al., 1998; Saitta et al., 2020):
ETc = Kc × ET0 (3)
A modified Penman-Monteith equation suitable for the greenhouse
was used to calculate the reference crop evapotranspiration (ET0, mm/
d) (Wang et al., 2006).
1713
0.408Δ(Rn − G) + γ T+273 (es − ea )
ET0 = (4)
Δ + 1.64γ
where Δ is the slope of the saturated vapor pressure curve (kPa/◦ C);
Δ = 2504⋅exp(17.27 T/(T+237.3))/(T+237.3)2; Rn is the net radiation
of the crop canopy (MJ/(m2⋅d)); G is the soil heat flux density (MJ/
(m2⋅d)), which is neglected because it is typically extremely small
compared with Rn; γ is the wet and dry constants of values, 0.067kPa/◦ C;
T is the daily average temperature at a height of 1.5–2.5 m above the
ground (◦ C). Tmax and Tmin are the daily maximum and minimum tem­
peratures at the surface height of 1.5–2.5 m (◦ C), respectively; es is the
average saturated vapor pressure at 1.5–2.5 m above the ground (kPa);
es = 0.3054⋅exp(17.27Tmax/(Tmax+237.3))+0.3054⋅exp(17.27Tmin/
(Tmin+237.3)); ea is the average actual vapor pressure at a height of
1.5–2.5 m above the ground (kPa); ea= 0.005⋅es(Tmin)
RHmax+0.005⋅es(Tmax)RHmin; RHmax and RHmin are the daily maximum
and minimum relative humidity at a height of 1.5–2.5 m above the
ground (%), respectively; Kc values in different growth periods were
selected based on the recommendations of FAO 56, i.e., 0.6, 1.15, and
0.9 for Kc ini, Kc mid, and Kc end, respectively (Allen et al., 1998).
In addition, to calculate the soil-moisture-data-based ETc (SM ETc)
through soil moisture data, the soil water balance method was used
R. Liao et al. Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632

S oil profile mois ture R eal-time Wireles s mois ture

(0-100 cm) monitoring s ens or

No S oil mois ture uptake by crops S oil mois ture data

Whether the mois ture central irrigation

E valuation
reaches the lower limit? controller

Y es
C alculation
Irrigation
Determination of irrigation oders
volume
Irrigation Irrigation
No Irrigation remind mes s age orders volume
Us er
Us ers decide whether to mobile
irrigate or not AP P
Irrigation
oders
Y es

wireles s Irrigation s ys tem

P erforming irrigation C ontrol R emind mes s age
control nodes s erver

Fig. 3. Logic diagram of the established irrigation system. Blue line represents the workflow of the automatic irrigation system, and red line represents the user’s
management process. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

(Allen et al., 1998; Liao et al., 2019b):

ETc = P + I + ΔMV − S − D (5)

where P is the amount of precipitation (mm). In this greenhouse study, P

was 0 mm. I is the irrigation volume (mm) obtained from Eq. (2); ΔMV is
the soil moisture variation (mm) for 0–80 cm soil depth, where ΔMV
= MVt1 − MVt2, in which MVt1 and MVt2 are the average soil water
storage (mm) of 0–80 cm soil depth at times t1 and t2, respectively; S and
D are the surface runoff and deep seepage below the root zone, respec­
tively, which are negligible in this study.
The IWUE (kg⋅m− 3) was obtained as follows:
IWUE = Y/V (6)

where Y is the yield (kg) measured at the harvest stage and V is the total
irrigation volume (m3).

3. Results

3.1. Soil moisture distributions and estimated dynamic crop WUD
Through real-time monitoring of the soil moisture data in the profile,
the soil moisture distributions indicated evident spatiotemporal char­
acteristics, i.e., with the growth of tomato, the soil moisture exhibited a
ladder trend for 0–60 cm and a stable trend for 60–100 cm (Fig. 4). The
tomato WUD can be determined using the characteristics of soil moisture
distributions; this approach is a better alternative to performing time-
consuming and labor-intensive work to measure the root data. As
shown in Fig. 4, in the seeding stage, all the soil moisture distributions
maintained a relatively stable trend because of the limited water de­
mand by tomato. Over time, the increasing water demand by tomato
caused variations in the soil moisture distributions, i.e., the soil moisture
for depths in the range of 0–20 cm started to decrease and that of other
depths remained stable. Subsequently, in the flowering and fruiting
stages, evident fluctuation characteristics were observed for depths in
the range of 40–60 cm, indicating that the tomato water uptake reached
this depth. Accordingly, the designed irrigation depth was determined to
be 60 cm. In the late fruiting and red ripe stages, with further water
demand by tomato, evident fluctuation over a period of time were
observed for depths in the range of 60–80 cm, which demonstrated that
Fig. 4. Real-time soil moisture distributions and estimated dynamic tomato
WUD during tomato growth period. All the soil moisture data from 0 to 100 cm
correspond to the soil volumetric moisture axis on the left. Red axis on the right
represents tomato WUD, and red dotted line is the estimated tomato water
uptake depth according to days (d) after sowing. (For interpretation of the
references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web
version of this article.)
the tomato water uptake might reach 80 cm. Therefore, a depth of 80 cm
was suggested to be a reasonable irrigation depth during this period.
Based on the spatiotemporal characteristics of soil moisture distribu­
tions, a fitted regression equation (WUDi = − 0.0119d2 + 1.9387d -
6.5795, R2 = 0.89) was obtained to depict the dynamic tomato WUD
(Fig. 4).
A typical period from 5/3–5/11, which was between two irrigation
events, was selected to illustrate an example. During this growth stage,
the tomato WUD can be estimated to be 60 cm since the real-time soil
moisture distributions decrease below 60 cm and were constant for
depths in the range of 60–100 cm (Fig. 5). The water uptake property of
tomato contributed to the variation in the soil moisture distributions
below 60 cm. In addition, based on the collected soil moisture data, the

5
R. Liao et al. Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632

amount of water consumed by tomato in one day was calculated via the
water balance method. The results demonstrated that the amount of
water consumed by tomato during the day (3.13 mm) was 22-fold
higher than that at night (0.14 mm).

3.2. ETc

To validate the reliability of utilizing the soil moisture data to esti­

mate the tomato WUD, real-time soil moisture data collected every hour
for 4 d of different growth stages were used as examples. The tomato
evapotranspiration (ETc) was calculated based on real-time soil moisture
data and real-time IM data, and a comparative analysis was conducted.
The soil water balance method was used to estimate the SM ETc. The
modified Penman-Monteith equation was applied to calculate the IM
ETc, which is typically regarded as a credible value to calculate the ETc.
The obtained results, including the SM ETc and IM ETc, are shown in
Fig. 6. In the seeding stage, the SM ETc of tomato was relatively small at
its initial period because the tomato had just been planted and the
requirement for water was not completely activated. However, the SM
Fig. 5. Real-time soil moisture distributions in typical time periods and days.
ETc increased gradually as the tomato grew. On April 20th, the SM ETc
(4.46 mm) of tomato exceeded the corresponding IM ETc (1.34 mm),
and this trend was maintained throughout the subsequent growth

Fig. 6. Real-time crop evapotranspiration based on soil moisture data (SM ETc) and real-time indoor meteorological data (AM ETc) at different growth stages: a)
seeding stage, b) flowering stage, c) fruiting stage, and d) red ripe stage. Linear regression analysis inside every diagram indicates the correlation and significant
degree between SM ETc and AM ETc.

6
R. Liao et al. Agricultural Water Management 245 (2021) 106632

periods. In this study, the IM ETc indicated characteristics of regular than that obtained in this study.
fluctuations, whereas unstable fluctuations (i.e., serrated shape) features
were observed in the SM ETc. Several factors may cause an unstable SM 4. Discussion
ETe, including the test accuracy and frequency of the sensors. Although
the values calculated using the two methods were not exactly the same, Automatic irrigation equipment is critical for the development of
the statistical results exhibited a significant (p < 0.01) linear regression irrigation agriculture in the future. In recent years, irrigation systems
relationship between the SM ETe and IM ETc values at different growth embedded with water-saving irrigation decision schemes have been
stages, verifying the reliability of using soil moisture data to estimate the further developed to improve IWUE (Giusti and Marsili-Libelli, 2015;
tomato WUD for guiding irrigation events. Osroosh et al., 2015; Xiao et al., 2010; Xu et al., 2011). In this study, a
synthetic irrigation strategy combining an automatic irrigation equip­
ment with a water-saving irrigation decision scheme was developed to in
3.3. Yield and IWUE turn facilitate the development of an automatic irrigation system. A
reasonable design was created to ensure the validity of the logical
The yield and IWUE of tomatoes are listed in Table 1. In the auto­ relationship and the orderly cooperation among various automatic
matic experiment plot based on the developed irrigation decision irrigation equipment, enabling laboratory-scale, user-friendly, and pre­
scheme (i.e., the designed irrigation depth was determined at every cise irrigation control. Compared with the constant designed irrigation
irrigation event based on the dynamic tomato WUD), irrigation events depth estimated by experimental experience in previously published
were performed 11 times (231 mm) during the entire growth period, reports (Jianhui and Shuzhen, 2003; Xuejun et al., 2010; Zhang et al.,
resulting in a yield of 9.51 kg/m2. Owing to less root growth, the soil 2017), the irrigation decision scheme indicated improvements, as
moisture for determining irrigation at the seedling stage was higher than evident from the dynamic irrigation depth versus crop growth in every
the designed lower limit, which was favorable for the early growth of irrigation event. Although setting a constant irrigation depth can
roots. In the control experiment plot based on the traditional irrigation simplify and ease irrigation operation, disregarding the actual depth of
decision scheme (i.e., the designed irrigation depth was maintained at a crop water uptake often results in less or more irrigation (Fiebig and
constant value of 50 cm), 13 irrigation events (238 mm) were performed Dodd, 2016; Sakai et al., 2015). In addition, owing to the lack of wireless
during the entire growth period, resulting in a yield of 7.53 kg/m2. profile moisture sensors in the past, wired probes with a datalogger were
Consequently, the IWUE of the automatic irrigation (41.23 kg/m3) was generally used to collect soil moisture data (dos Santos et al., 2016;
higher than that of the control treatment (31.58 kg/m3). Satchithanantham et al., 2014; Srivastava et al., 2017). Installing these
In addition, several similar cases involving tomato irrigation exper­ wired probes in the soil profile is a time consuming and labor intensive
iments were summarized to present contrasting results (Table 2). For all work. Moreover, the disjunction between the sensors and controller will
these cases, the IWUE was less than 42.7 kg/m3, except for one treat­ result in an untimely and inadequate irrigation, which hinders the
ment wherein an IWUE of 51.15 kg/m3 was obtained. The obtained development of automatic irrigation systems.
IWUE value (41.23 kg/m3) of the developed irrigation system was In this study, wireless profile moisture sensors were employed to
relatively higher compared with those of the previous studies, thereby obtain real-time soil moisture data. These data were used to estimate the
further verifying the effectiveness and superiority of the automatic dynamic tomato WUD, which may be a reliable reference for the design
irrigation system over traditional methods (from case 1 to case 3). of irrigation depth. Subsequently, a precise irrigation decision scheme
Although the irrigation events in case 4 were controlled by an automatic was established by supplying water to real-time tomato WUD to avoid
irrigation system, its irrigation decision scheme based on a constant soil under- or over- irrigation. The proposed water-saving irrigation decision
moisture threshold and the dynamic changes in tomato WUD during scheme using dynamic tomato WUD as the designed irrigation depth
different growth periods were not considered, resulting in a lower IWUE threshold for every irrigation event was based on the principle of
available soil water content. Generally, only water available in soil
Table 1 (which can be effectively utilized by crop roots) contributes to the crop
Comparative analysis of irrigation water utilization efficiency (IWUE) of tomato. yield, whereas over-irrigation water or under-irrigation water will
Experiment Drip Irrigation volume (mm) IWUE (kg/m3) negatively affect the water-use efficiency or yield (Liao et al., 2019a;
irrigation
Range Average Range Average Salter and Haworth, 1961). Replacing the empirically obtained values
scheme
with the tomato WUD greatly improved the irrigation accuracy and
Designed Based on 231 234.5 41.23 36.41 IWUE. The yields achieved for tomato in this study were 9.51 and
dynamic 7.53 kg/m2 for the developed automatic irrigation system using the
irrigation
depth
dynamic irrigation depth and the control treatment applying the con­
Control Based on 238 31.58 stant irrigation depth, respectively. Furthermore, the developed auto­
constant matic irrigation system resulted in an enhanced IWUE (41.23 kg/m3 of
irrigation the developed automatic irrigation system vs. 31.58 kg/m3 of the con­
depth
trol treatment) and required lesser irrigation volume (231 mm) than the
Case 1 ( Constant 250.4–768.2 456.1 19.42–51.15 34.8
Xuejun irrigation control treatment (238 mm). In addition, similar cases applying irriga­
et al., volumes tion systems, including automatic and manual irrigation systems to
2010) produce tomatoes, have further confirmed the superiority of using the
Case 2 ( Based on 191.6–356.2 273.9 21.75–37.26 30.36 developed automatic irrigation system (Jianhui and Shuzhen, 2003;
Zhang ET0
et al.,
Xuejun et al., 2010; Zhang et al., 2017; Zotarelli et al., 2009). For
2017) example, nine groups of treatments were designed with different irri­
Case 3 ( Empirical 322.5–337.5 330 15.05–20.25 17.83 gation times and irrigation volumes for a greenhouse tomato irrigation
Jianhui irrigation experiment, in which the highest IWUE of 51.15 kg/m3 was obtained
and regime
after 15 irrigation events (250.5 mm), and that of the remaining eight
Shuzhen,
2003) groups were between 19.42 and 43.00 kg/m3 with an average of
Case 4 ( Based on 78.0–361.9 225 15.9–42.7 28.02 34.8 kg/m3 (Xuejun et al., 2010). Other greenhouse tomato experiments
Zotarelli constant applying various irrigation decision schemes, including those based on
et al., moisture ET0 (Zhang et al., 2017), empirical irrigation regime (Jianhui and
2009)
Shuzhen, 2003), and dynamic moisture (Zotarelli et al., 2009), to

7
R. Liao et al.
produce tomatoes achieved the highest IWUEs of 37.26, 20.25, and
42.7 kg/m3, respectively, which were lower than the IWUE obtained in
this study. In summary, compared with other irrigation decision
schemes, the developed smart drip irrigation system based on dynamic
irrigation depth provides a promising solution for addressing the chal­
lenges of water shortage and food security.
5. Conclusion
An automatic drip irrigation system including wireless moisture
sensors, wireless control nodes, and a central irrigation controller was
developed to perform irrigation events in a greenhouse tomato culti­
vation experiment. Compared with the previous irrigation decision
schemes, the designed irrigation depth was determined at every irriga­
tion event based on the dynamic irrigation depth estimated from real-
time soil moisture data. The spatiotemporal characteristics of soil
moisture distributions helped obtain a reliable estimation of the tomato
WUD, thereby enabling a precise and automatic control of the effective
irrigation depth to avoid water leakage or deficiency. A significant linear
regression relationship (p < 0.01) between SM ETc and IM ETc values
was observed, confirming the reliability of using real-time soil moisture
data to estimate the tomato WUD. The developed irrigation system re­
alizes remote monitoring and control through the use of a mobile
network, and the network data-sharing capability offered users a simple
method (i.e., using a smartphone) to manage the irrigation events. Using
this automatic irrigation system, more yield was obtained with less
irrigation water inputs, and the IWUE of tomatoes reached 41.23 kg/m3,
which was higher than that of the control treatment of 31.58 kg/m3.
Moreover, a comparative study demonstrated that the IWUE of the
developed irrigation system was almost higher than that reported in
other studies. This study reasonably estimated the tomato WUD from the
distribution characteristics of soil moisture in the profile, providing a
real-time and effortless method to determine the dynamic designed
irrigation depth for guiding irrigation events. The performance of the
profile moisture sensor is the key to achieving precision irrigation;
therefore, the improvement of sensor test accuracy and resolution can
further enhance the irrigation efficiency.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
This study was funded by Major Project of Science and Technology of
Yunnan Province (202002AE090010), Innovation Ability Construction
Project of Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences
(KJCX20180703, KJCXKJCX20200430), Agricultural Sci-tech Extension
of Beijing Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences (20200401),
and China Post-doctoral International Exchange Program (20180003).
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