FarMind will enable vertical farms to reduce energy use and optimise plant growth to save up to 50% of production costs, allowing vertical farms to grow from niche solution to leading urban suppliers. Each plant and each plant growth stage have specific lighting needs to maximise photosynthesis. However, no existing vertical farm gathers and processes the data necessary to track indoor conditions to adapt them to an optimal photosynthesis regime. In addition to the cost of lighting, other parameters, such as nutrients, moisture and temperature are not currently effectively managed to maximise photosynthesis nor plant growth at any given time in a plant’s lifecycle. Tracking indoor conditions at the same time as monitoring the response of plants to these conditions is therefore key to optimising the future production of greens on our planet.
FarMind is designed to be an all-in-one plug and play solution for any vertical farm. We have applied a chemical engineering approach to solving a biological problem, relying on three fundamentally new concepts: 1) game-changing understanding of photosynthesis, 2) our proprietary control unit design, and 3) in-house created AI software. FarMind, tested in collaboration with tens of pilot partners, consists of a series of sensors and cameras installed throughout the farm that monitor the photosynthetic conditions (i.e. growth stage, nutrients, temperature, CO2, moisture) for every crop type within a vertical farm. The data gathered is then fed into our AI system, which creates a lighting strategy for each LED light of the farm. A control unit, connected to each LED, has been developed to finally instruct each target LED light to supply the plant with the exact lighting parameters, specifying amplitude, duration, period, filling (on-and-off ratio), power of pulse, sequence order of pulsation for red and blue channels that match the exact plant’s needs.
