A partnership has been established between Prairie View A&M University and Sentek Technologies to test and calibrate Sentek’s newly released Drill & Drop soil moisture monitoring probe. Sentek, an Australian Company with an international presence, provides sensors and solutions for precision measurement and management of soil water and salinity dynamics.
Research Professor and Interim Associate Director of Research Ali Fares is the Principal investigator on this project. Last year, Sentek staff provided training on how to install and maintain the Drill & Drop probes to members of the Water Team. On February 1 and 2, 2017, Research Scientist Ripendra Awal, Post-Doc Researchers Haimanote Bayabil and Almouatz El Hassen, and undergraduate student Yassine Cherif installed six probes on the PVAMU Research and Demonstration Farm and started logging them at a variable time steps. These probes will be used to collect soil moisture data needed for the calibration. Additional information on Sentek can be found at this link.
Figure 1. Haimanote Bayabil, Ripendra Awal, Yassine Cherif, and Almouatz El Hassen (from front right to front left) after installing the six sensors.
Figure 2. Yassine Cherif During Installation of the Drop & Drill Soil Moisture Probe at the Site of the Experiment.
Ali Fares, Ph.D.
Interim Associate Director, Cooperative Agricultural Research Center
alfares@pvamu.edu
(936) 261-5019