Failure analysis of a smart sensor node for precision agriculture

Nowadays, the use of big data analysis and IoT (Internet of Things) technologies is growing tremendously within companies and organizations in several different application fields. In this scenario, smart farming refers to monitoring of environmental conditions and soil parameter to improve farm productivity, to optimize soil conservation, to save water and to limit plant diseases. During the design of such innovative IoT technologies it is fundamental to carry out a reliability and failure analysis of the device. This could allow to introduce adequate diagnostic solutions to improve the system's availability. In this work, a failure analysis using FMEA (Failure Modes and Effects Analysis) approach of a smart sensor node for precision farming has been developed. The results of the analysis allow to improve the design of the device introducing a diagnostic-oriented prototype able to solve the major criticalities arisen during the FMEA.