The St. Louis startup Impossible Sensing is moving forward with the development of a new soil sensor that could provide real-time data on nutrient levels, soil health, water conditions and other factors around individual plants.
The company began field tests Thursday of a second-generation prototype sensor at Reckamp Farms in Wright City, west of St. Louis.
“This is the first time this goes to the real world,” said Pablo Sobron, who founded Impossible Sensing. “We tested it in the lab, in the backyard in the city, and now it’s coming to a farm.”
The tests on Thursday consisted of digging a hole a few inches deep and then firing a high-powered laser that can measure the specific soil conditions at around 30 different sites.
It’s different from how farmers typically test their soil by collecting samples every few acres, Sobron said. The level of granularity from his instrument can reveal variations in nutrient levels and soil conditions in the same field and could prove the catalyst to unlocking some of the loftiest goals of precision agriculture, he said.
About a half-dozen engineers and plant scientists involved in the project joined Sobron for the first tests at Reckamp Farms, along with the farm’s owner, Dave Reckamp, and a few neighboring farmers.
Reckamp said he was most interested in learning what was missing in the soil in the pumpkin patch where soil was tested.
“If I’m lacking phosphorus and potassium, nitrogen, calcium,” he said. “Now the big thing is sulfur, magnesium, boron and all that.”
Knowing exactly what's in his fields, and what's missing, would help with purchasing the necessary inputs, Reckamp said.
“If you know what you need in your soil ahead of time, you might be able to prebuy it,” he said. “Also save yourself money knowing the different ingredients that you need for putting in the crops.”
The field test is an important step for the technology that is moving toward a more commercial application. Part of that process includes handing the reins to a new company solely focused on commercializing this type of sensor, Sobron said.
“I decided a few years ago to really do what I love to do and what I’m best at, which is inventing new technology,” he said. “Our business model is simple. It’s a licensing model. Impossible (Sensing) owns the core IP, and then we license exclusively to different companies.”
In this case, that new company is SoilCode, Sobron said.
“They’re the ones who take this prototype into a product,” he added.
Moving forward, Calden Carroll, who is helping with the commercialization of the Soilcode instrument, said the aim is to have a handheld sensor that could be integrated onto the back of a tractor or planter next spring.
“So that we can start to get this same type of data that we’re doing today, but with a select few people who are running planters with this instrument attached to it,” he said.
The ultimate vision and goal is to provide farmers with an instrument that can seamlessly provide more context and information about what is in their fields without extra work on their end, Carroll said.
“As promising as (new technologies) may be, as soon as you talk to a grower about this, it just becomes another thing on their task list that they have to do,” he said. “These guys are busy, so we’re trying to make this as lightweight and unobtrusive as possible.”
