CONNECT researchers in TSSG at Waterford Institute of Technology have been placed in the Top Ten in the annual IEEE ComSoc student competition for their entry, “Connected Cows- Fog Assistance Towards Data Driven Smart Dairy Farming”. The theme of this year’s contest was “Communications Technology Changing the World”.
The team included Mohit Taneja (leader), with Nikita Jalodia, John Byabazaire, and mentors: Dr Alan Davy and Cristian Olariu (IBM Ireland). Their project focused on the early detection of lameness in dairy cows, i.e., before signs are apparent. It presented a fog computing application system for data analysis.
“Farmers work hard – from 5am till late in the evening – so it is a challenge to monitor the wellbeing of hundreds of cows in a dairy farm in real time,” according to Mohit. “Moreover, as the size and scale of farms increases it becomes difficult to keep track of the health of each single cow in the herd. There is also the added pressure of keeping up the milk quota, which ultimately contributes to the country’s milk production capacity. Technology can help, and that’s where we come in. In this tech-savvy and data-driven era, it’s easier to manage and see the health of the whole herd on a mobile phone.”
CONNECT is the world leading Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Future Networks and Communications. CONNECT is funded under the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centres Programme and is co-funded under the European Regional Development Fund. We engage with over 35 companies including large multinationals, SMEs and start-ups. CONNECT brings together world-class expertise from ten Irish academic institutes to create a one-stop-shop for telecommunications research, development and innovation.
