Used in NASA missions to analyze the chemical composition of rocks on Mars, the Libs technique helps the producer in a deeper analysis of the soil. The result is increased productivity with sustainability
Observed for years, Mars is slowly beginning to be unraveled thanks to the advancement of technology. The good news, as usual when talking about the space industry, is that most of the innovations there end up making their way into everyday life. That's how it was with scratch-resistant eyeglass lenses, and that's exactly what's happening now. The little robot that illustrates this page, Perseverance, landed on the Red Planet on February 18 of this year to investigate its biology and geology, as well as the possibility of the place having been habitable in the past. The equipment is an evolution of a soil analysis technology already tested there and which, at the moment, is gaining scale in the Brazilian field.
It is a small telescope and a high power laser, which shoots laser pulses against the rocks of Mars and the crops of Brazil. "The light that reflects off the material is collected and analyzed," said Ivair Gontijo, a systems engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), a division of the US space agency. If on Mars the analysis helps to discover the existence or not of extraterrestrial life, in agriculture it is helping Brazilian producers to collect data that can increase productivity in the field in a sustainable way.
Technology has a name and a nickname. In English it was called Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy, but you can simply call it Libs. In Portuguese it means optical emission spectrometry with laser-induced plasma. The term is complex, but the way the technology works is (a little) simpler. It consists of the chemical analysis of samples by means of a high-energy pulsed laser, which reaches temperatures of the order of 9.7 thousandºC, equivalent to the surface of the Sun. When the laser interacts with the sample, it causes the material to explode, generating a plasma – a cloud with protons, neutrons and free electrons. This plasma emits light characteristic of the composition of matter, which is analyzed by a spectrometer, allowing the detection of chemical elements such as phosphorus, iron, zinc and carbon.
To meet the demand of soil study, a robot that walked in the field was adapted in a bench, named as aglibs
In Brazil, Embrapa Instrumentação began researching the technique in the 2000s. “Back then, we were already concerned about climate change and sustainable production. So we started testing this technique for soil carbon analysis,” said Débora Milori, a researcher at the institution. The studies served as the basis for the Pecus Project, launched in partnership with the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (Mapa), which aimed to quantify emissions from Brazilian livestock in a more precise way. “The results were really cool in the laboratory, driving the development of new models even better, with more portable and accurate systems”, says Débora. After approval by the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPQ), Embrapa, in partnership with the University of São Paulo (USP), installed the Libs system on top of a metal body, nicknamed Robot Mirã I.
IN PRACTICE The prototype caught the attention of agronomist Fábio Angelis, who worked for more than ten years in a multinational company and today is the founder and CEO of Agrorobótica, agtech for physical and chemical soil analysis. “I saw Libs' potential in reducing environmental impacts: in addition to quantifying carbon, it could replace the use of reagents in the chemical methods used by laboratories in soil analysis,” he said. Angelis then approached Embrapa and researcher Débora, establishing a partnership for the development of the technology that was called Aglibs. The commercial operation began last year, with some changes, and is starting to gain scale. At the company, the robot installed on a bench is already capable of analyzing more than 1,000 soil samples daily, providing data on the amount of organic carbon, texture (sand, silt and clay contents) and pH. According to the entrepreneur, the switch to a fixed robot instead of a mobile one was cost-effective. “With this model, we guarantee more assertiveness and efficiency, as we can quickly digitize all the results and make them available to the producer via application”, he said. With the results generated, agtech provides agronomic recommendations and the producer can make corrections in the soil. According to the company, with the technology it is possible to increase crop productivity by up to six times. In addition, it provides savings in the use of inputs, since by understanding the chemical composition of the land, the producer makes a more conscious management. The environmental gain is twofold: in addition to reducing the use of chemicals in farming, it can – and should – be used to measure and prove the amount of carbon present in the soil. “Brazil is going to be the biggest carbon credit market in the world,” said Angelis. And it is in this market that he bets. To date, the company has analyzed more than 80,000 samples, charging R$ 100 per hectare.
Even with economic and environmental benefits, the use of robots in scale is uncertain due to the high cost. and the duration of the product in the field
FUTURE Even with the example of practical use by Agrorobotics, the popularization of this technology, specifically, and robotics in general, still faces great challenges. The amount paid by the producer, according to Mateus Mondin, a professor at Esalq-USP, is one of them. “The cost is still very high, but considering the cheapness of the technologies, I see great future potential”, he said. At the other end, the researcher argues that product turnover can also be a factor of lack of interest, “since it is normally a long-lasting equipment”, he said.
