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Intelligent Agricultural Machinery Equipment for Boosting Grain and Oil Crop...
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Intelligent Agricultural Machinery Equipment for Boosting Grain and Oil Crop Yields

A special issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472). This special issue belongs to the section "Agricultural Technology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 April 2026) | Viewed by 3488

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Xiaojun Gao

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Engineering, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 211800, China
Interests: seeding robots; autonomous driving; variable seeding; variable fertilization; deep learning; sensor fusion; planting depth regulation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Lei Wang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Engineering, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 211800, China
Interests: unmanned farms; seeding robots; variable seeding; variable fertilization; path planning; algorithm optimization; harvesting robots
Dr. Yinyan Shi

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Engineering, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 211800, China
Interests: electric agricultural machinery; mowing robots; multi-spectral imaging; variable fertilization; algorithm optimization; facility agriculture
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Intelligent agricultural machinery represents the integration of agricultural modernization and information technology, emerging in response to global challenges such as population growth and resource and labor shortages. Since the beginning of the 21st century, breakthroughs in satellite navigation, the Internet of Things, and artificial intelligence have ushered the agricultural machinery used in grain and oil crop cultivation into a new era of intelligence. Following the rise of precision agriculture after the year 2000, machinery began integrating GPS positioning and variable control technology. After 2010, applications such as autonomous driving, UAV-based crop protection, and intelligent harvesting robots were increasingly applied. These technologies utilize sensors to analyze soil, grain, and oil crop data in real time, enabling a closed-loop system of decision-making and execution. Currently, intelligent agricultural machinery is advancing the digitalization, automation, and sustainability of agricultural production, serving as a vital pillar in ensuring global food and oil security.

This Special Issue focuses on the application of automation and information technology in grain and oil crop agricultural machinery. With this goal in mind, it welcomes highly interdisciplinary high-quality studies from disparate research fields including precision agriculture technology, unmanned farms, agricultural robots, autonomous operation platforms, automatic navigation, operation path planning, perception and recognition technology, the research and development of UAVs, and intelligent sensing systems. Original research articles and reviews are accepted.

Dr. Xiaojun Gao
Dr. Lei Wang
Dr. Yinyan Shi
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agriculture is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • precision agriculture
  • grain and oil crop
  • unmanned farms
  • agricultural robot
  • automatic navigation
  • path planning
  • perception and recognition
  • variables operation
  • algorithm optimization
 

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

21 pages, 4337 KB  
Article
Study on the Performance of Seedling-Carrying Potting for Mechanical Transplanting of Oilseed Rape and Its Effect on Seedling Growth
by Wei Quan, Jingyuan Sun, Haiyang Chen, Fanggang Shi, Xiaohu Jiang, Dongcai Tao, Hao Zhong and Mingliang Wu
Agriculture 2026, 16(6), 635; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture16060635 - 10 Mar 2026
Viewed by 354
Abstract
This study proposed a standardized oilseed rape seedling-carrying potting molding method to improve the adaptability of mechanical transplanting of potting seedlings. This method aims to address the failure in seedling pick-up and transport during the mechanized transplanting of rapeseed pot seedlings, which is [...] Read more.
This study proposed a standardized oilseed rape seedling-carrying potting molding method to improve the adaptability of mechanical transplanting of potting seedlings. This method aims to address the failure in seedling pick-up and transport during the mechanized transplanting of rapeseed pot seedlings, which is caused by matrix breakage and seedling damage. This study selected cylindrical oilseed rape seedling-carrying potting as the research object and investigated the relationship between the physical characteristics of seedling-carrying potting and the proportion of the composition of the matrix soil as well as the characteristics of seedling growth after planting. The optimal parameter combination of the matrix soil was obtained using Design-Expert 8.0.6 software: dry matter ratio of 4:1, compression ratio of 0.36, and moisture content of 45%. A single-factor test was conducted using a seedling-carrying potting test bed. According to the single-factor test results, the dry matter ratios (commercial substrate: clay loam mass ratios of 2:1, 3:1, and 4:1), matrix soil compression ratios (0.35, 0.40, and 0.45), and matrix soil moisture content (35%, 40%, and 45%) were selected as the factors of influence, while the drop loss rate, shear resistance, and scattering rate were used as the indicators of evaluation. The drop loss rate of seedling-carrying potting under this parameter combination was 1.5%, the shear resistance was 7.1 N, and the scattering rate was 34.9%. Validation tests were conducted on a seedling-carrying potting test bed, and the relative errors between the actual and simulated values of the drop loss rate, shear resistance, and scattering rate were 7.1%, 7.0%, and 8.4%, respectively, verifying the accuracy of the model and the optimized parameters. Comparison tests of the growth characteristics of the optimized seedling-carrying potting, hole-tray seedling, and bare seedling in field transplanting were conducted. The results displayed that root length, root diameter, root dry matter, chlorophyll content, and seedling vigor index consistently followed the same descending order: seedling-carrying potting > hole-tray seedlings > bare seedlings. Compared to hole-tray seedlings, the corresponding growth characteristics of seedling-carrying potting were 11.7%, 10%, 21.7%, 2.8%, and 27.8% higher, respectively. Compared to bare seedlings, they were 17.1%, 12.5%, 32.2%, 10.8%, and 32.7% higher, respectively. The seedling length, seedling width, plant taper angle, and dry matter mass of stem and leaves were, in descending order, greater in hole-tray seedlings, followed by seedling-carrying potting, and then bare seedlings. In comparison, the corresponding growth characteristics of seedling-carrying potting were 8.9%, 9.8%, 2.3%, and 30.6% higher than those of bare seedlings, respectively. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Intelligent Agricultural Machinery Equipment for Boosting Grain and Oil Crop Yields)
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19 pages, 5965 KB  
Article
Design of Electrical Control System for Precision Rice Hill Direct-Seeding Device and Seeding Performance Comparison Test
by Hanqing Li, Ke Yang, Lin Ling, Bingxin Yan, Guangwei Wu, Xiaojun Gao and Shengnan Liu
Agriculture 2025, 15(16), 1716; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture15161716 - 8 Aug 2025
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1230
Abstract
This study develops a novel electric-driven metering device to address the mismatch between the seeder rotation speed and vehicle speed in traditional mechanical precision hill direct-seeding metering devices for rice, which is caused by wheel slippage. The device integrates a Global Navigation Satellite [...] Read more.
This study develops a novel electric-driven metering device to address the mismatch between the seeder rotation speed and vehicle speed in traditional mechanical precision hill direct-seeding metering devices for rice, which is caused by wheel slippage. The device integrates a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) speed measurement module and an optimised incremental Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) control algorithm, enabling precise seeding through electric drive. A multidisciplinary collaborative design approach is employed, and field experiments are conducted to evaluate the performance of the novel device under conditions of vehicle speeds ranging from 3 to 5 km/h, theoretical hill spacings of 0.15–0.25 m, and seeding rate adjustment positions of 1/3–1. The experiments use two rice varieties, “Longken 2021” from the northern rice growing region and “Jingliangyou Huazhan” from the southern rice growing region. The results demonstrate that the novel electric-driven metering device significantly outperformed the traditional mechanical device in terms of seeding precision, hill formation performance, and seeding rate accuracy. The novel device achieves a qualified rate of seeds per hill of 90.54%, with seedling omission and seed damage rates reduced to 4.98% and 0.69%, respectively. The hill diameter qualification rate increases to 95.21%, with no empty hills observed. The coefficient of variation of seeds per hill is maintained at 21.98%, meeting the agronomic requirement of 2–12 seeds per hill for conventional rice. However, for seeds with high moisture content and poor flowability (soaked seeds), the seed damage rate increases slightly by 0.47 percentage points. This study provided an efficient and reliable technical solution for the intelligent upgrading of precision rice direct-seeding equipment. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Intelligent Agricultural Machinery Equipment for Boosting Grain and Oil Crop Yields)
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21 pages, 3319 KB  
Article
Design and Experimentation of a Low-Damage Combined Full-Feeding Peanut Picking Device
by Jinming Zheng, Shuqi Shang, Ning Zhang, Yao Wu, Xiaochan Wang and Nan Xu
Agriculture 2025, 15(13), 1394; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture15131394 - 28 Jun 2025
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1018
Abstract
To address the issues of high pod damage rate and unpicked pod rate in the picking device of peanut picking combine harvesters during the harvesting of sun-dried peanuts, a low-damage peanut picking device was developed. This device combines flat pin teeth with a [...] Read more.
To address the issues of high pod damage rate and unpicked pod rate in the picking device of peanut picking combine harvesters during the harvesting of sun-dried peanuts, a low-damage peanut picking device was developed. This device combines flat pin teeth with a two-stage round steel concave screen. Contact models between the picking components and peanut pods, as well as between pods and the concave screen, were analyzed to determine the optimal structural parameters of the picking components and the most suitable concave screen type. Using peanut plants that had been dug, windrowed, and naturally sun-dried in the field for 3–5 days as test material, bench tests were conducted with pod breakage rate and unpicked pod rate as evaluation indices. The installation direction of the picking elements and the combination form of the concave screen were used as experimental factors. The optimal configuration was determined to be flat pin teeth installed with parallel axial forward bending with a tip fillet radius of 6 mm, and a concave screen composed of right round steel + straight round steel with front sparse and rear dense type. Field comparative experiments with a conventional picking device—comprising cylindrical bar teeth and a straight round steel concave screen—showed that the pod breakage rate decreased from 1.92% to 1.17%, and the unpicked pod rate decreased from 1.14% to 0.62%. This study provides a theoretical basis for the structural optimization and performance enhancement of the threshing device in peanut picking combine harvesters. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Intelligent Agricultural Machinery Equipment for Boosting Grain and Oil Crop Yields)
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