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Agronomy
Special Issues
Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ
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Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ

A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395). This special issue belongs to the section "Agricultural Biosystem and Biological Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 February 2022) | Viewed by 14768

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Jung Eek Son

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Plant Science, Seoul National University, Gwanak-gu, Seoul 08826, Korea
Interests: vertical farm; greenhouse horticulture; soilless culture; electrical lighting; growth modelling; FSPM; deep learning; spectrum conversion film
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Eiji Goto

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Graduate School of Horticulture, Chiba University, Matusdo, Chiba 271-8510, Japan
Interests: plant environmental control; phytochemicals; plant responses to environments; lighting technology in greenhouse and vertical farm; photosynthesis measurement; growth modeling
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Qichang Yang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Institute of Urban Agriculture, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (IUA-CAAS), Chengdu, China
Interests: vertical farming; plant factory; LED lighting; greenhouse horticulture; energy use efficiency; environmental control
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Myung-Min Oh

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Horticultural Science, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju, Chungbuk 28644, Korea
Interests: vertical farm; environmental control; phytochemicals; lighting technology; electroculture; medicinal plants

Special Issue Information

Dear colleagues,

With the rapid growth of the global population, there is an urgent need to develop adaptive agricultural strategies to guarantee future food security without requiring additional land. Vertical farming is a new promising method of growing crops in many stacked layers under fully controlled conditions with artificial lighting that can stably produce high-yield and high-quality crops. Indoor farms and plant factories with artificial light (PFALs) are another term used to describe vertical farms.

Vertical farming has advantages such as intensive crop production, year-round planned production, clean and high-quality production, and labour-saving production, regardless of time and space. Therefore, the production of leafy vegetables for salads on vertical farms has already been commercialized. However, at present, vertical farming has major limitations of high initial and running costs as well as difficulties in nutrition solution management. High value-added crops such as medicinal plants can be a good solution to improving the profits of vertical farming, and have recently been cultivated to obtain health-beneficial phytochemicals.

Therefore, relevant and updated knowledge and technologies are required for vertical farming. From academic and industrial perspectives, the role of vertical farming is becoming more and more important as a next-generation plant production system. Last year, we successfully published the Special Issue on the “Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series I.” Additionally, this year, we propose “Series II” of the same topic for a broader range of applications.

Prof. Dr. Jung Eek Son
Prof. Dr. Eiji Goto
Prof. Dr. Qichang Yang
Prof. Dr. Myung-Min Oh
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agronomy is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Plant production
  • Vertical farm
  • Plant factory
  • Artificial lighting
  • Environmental control
  • Photosynthesis
  • Energy use efficiency
  • Phytochemicals
  • Medicinal plants
  • Plant responses to environments
  • Nutrient solution
  • Growth modelling
  • Growth monitoring
  • Artificial intelligence
  • Mechanization and automation
  • Sustainability
  • Space farming
  • Industrialization

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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18 pages, 4072 KiB  
Article
DNA Methylation and RNA-Sequencing Analysis to Identify Genes Related to Spontaneous Leaf Spots in a Wheat Variety ‘Zhongkenuomai No.1’
by Zhibin Xu, Fang Wang, Xiaoli Fan, Bo Feng, Qiang Zhou, Qichang Yang and Tao Wang
Agronomy 2022, 12(7), 1519; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12071519 - 24 Jun 2022
Viewed by 1833
Abstract
Greenish leaf variation has been reported widely as a trait of great interest in wheat for improving photosynthesis. Zhongkenuomai No.1 (ZKNM1), a mutant with recoverable leaf spots, was regarded as a suitable material for studying chlorophyll synthesis-related mechanisms. In this study, transcriptome and [...] Read more.
Greenish leaf variation has been reported widely as a trait of great interest in wheat for improving photosynthesis. Zhongkenuomai No.1 (ZKNM1), a mutant with recoverable leaf spots, was regarded as a suitable material for studying chlorophyll synthesis-related mechanisms. In this study, transcriptome and DNA methylation analyses were conducted in ZKNM1 leaves to determine the transcriptional regulatory mechanism of leaf spot development. Ultimately, 890 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were discovered, with chlorophyll biosynthesis pathway genes downregulated and chlorophyll degradation pathway genes upregulated, possibly acting as a double block to chlorophyll accumulation. Among them, HEMA1s (Glutamyl-tRNA reductase family proteins) and PORAs (protochlorophyllide oxidoreductase A) were the most important controlled genes. Furthermore, a genome-wide methylation analysis indicates that a hypermethylated region is present 1690 bp upstream of the transcriptional start sites in spot tissues (SPs), and 131 DNA methylation-mediated DEGs were identified, one of which encoded a putative resistance gene (TraesCS1A02G009500) and was a hub gene in interaction network modules. In the sample groups with leaf spots (SPs), this gene may be involved in the photosynthetic processes. The findings indicated that dynamic variations in DNA methylation play key roles in gene regulation to govern leaf spot development. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ)
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16 pages, 3731 KiB  
Article
Variations in the Growth of Cotyledons and Initial True Leaves as Affected by Photosynthetic Photon Flux Density at Individual Seedlings and Nutrients
by Eri Hayashi, Yumiko Amagai, Toyoki Kozai, Toru Maruo, Satoru Tsukagoshi, Akimasa Nakano and Masahumi Johkan
Agronomy 2022, 12(1), 194; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12010194 - 13 Jan 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2645
Abstract
Plant factories with artificial lighting (PFALs), with well-insulated and airtight structures, enable the production of large quantities of high-quality plants year-round while achieving high resource use efficiency. However, despite the controlled environment in PFALs, variations in plant individuals have been found, which affect [...] Read more.
Plant factories with artificial lighting (PFALs), with well-insulated and airtight structures, enable the production of large quantities of high-quality plants year-round while achieving high resource use efficiency. However, despite the controlled environment in PFALs, variations in plant individuals have been found, which affect productivity in PFAL operations. Plant phenotyping plays a crucial role in understanding how the surrounding microenvironment affects variations in plant phenotypes. In the current study, a modular phenotyping system for seedling production was developed, focusing on practicality and scalability in commercial PFALs. Experiments on seedlings, which strongly affect productivity, were conducted to obtain cotyledon unfolding time and the time series projected area of cotyledons and true leaves of individual seedlings of romaine lettuce (Lactuca sativa L. var. longifolia), using RGB images. This was also undertaken to analyze how the surrounding microenvironment of photosynthetic photon flux densities and nutrients affect growth variations for plant cohort research. In agreement with the actual measurements, variations in seedling growth were identified even under similar microenvironments. Furthermore, the results demonstrated larger variations in seedlings with higher relative growth. Aiming for simplified interactions of phenotypes with the microenvironment, management, and genotype, seedling selection and breeding with plant production in PFALs may enable plant uniformity and higher productivity. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ)
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19 pages, 3968 KiB  
Article
Effects of White LED Lighting with Specific Shorter Blue and/or Green Wavelength on the Growth and Quality of Two Lettuce Cultivars in a Vertical Farming System
by Thi Kim Loan Nguyen, Kye Man Cho, Hee Yul Lee, Du Yong Cho, Ga Oun Lee, Seong Nam Jang, Yongki Lee, Daesup Kim and Ki-Ho Son
Agronomy 2021, 11(11), 2111; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11112111 - 21 Oct 2021
Cited by 16 | Viewed by 6197
Abstract
White (W) light-emitting diode (LED) light has been used as an efficient light source for commercial plant cultivation in vertical farming. This study aimed to examine the effect of W LED light sources on the growth and quality of butterhead and romaine lettuce. [...] Read more.
White (W) light-emitting diode (LED) light has been used as an efficient light source for commercial plant cultivation in vertical farming. This study aimed to examine the effect of W LED light sources on the growth and quality of butterhead and romaine lettuce. Three W LED light sources including normal W light (NWL) which has 450 nm as its pumping wavelength and two specific W lights (SWL1 and SWL2) with shorter blue peak wavelength (437 nm) were used to grow lettuce in comparison to a red (R) and blue (B) LED combination. As a result, SWL1 and SWL2 treatments with the same electrical power or photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD) resulted in more growth of both lettuce cultivars compared to RB treatment. Some phenolic and flavonol contents were increased in the RB treatment, whereas SWL2 treatment stimulated the accumulation of other phenolic and flavonol compounds. Meanwhile, neither NWL nor SWL1 treatments increased the individual phenolic and flavonol contents in either cultivar (except for some flavonols in romaine lettuce in the SWL1 group). In addition, light and energy use efficiencies were also highest in the SWL1 and SWL2 treatments. These results illustrate the positive effects of specific W LED light on lettuce growth and quality, and suggest that the specific W LED light sources, especially SWL2, could be preferably used in vertical farming. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ)
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Review

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9 pages, 281 KiB  
Review
Rerouting Artificial Light for Efficient Crops Production: A Review of Lighting Strategy in PFALs
by Xinying Liu, Yaliang Xu, Yu Wang, Qichang Yang and Qingming Li
Agronomy 2022, 12(5), 1021; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12051021 - 24 Apr 2022
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2676
Abstract
A plant factory with artificial light (PFAL) is defined as an advanced agricultural production system with a precisely controlled environment, playing an important role in vertical farming and urban food supply. Artificial light is one of the core technologies in PFALs and accounts [...] Read more.
A plant factory with artificial light (PFAL) is defined as an advanced agricultural production system with a precisely controlled environment, playing an important role in vertical farming and urban food supply. Artificial light is one of the core technologies in PFALs and accounts for a large part of energy consumption; elevating the light utilization efficiency of plants is vital for the sustainable development of PFALs. Meanwhile, the enclosed structure of the plant factory resulted in the independence of its light environment, indicating that the light environment in PFALs can be custom-made. Lighting strategy is an attempt to reprogram the light environmental parameters in unconventional ways, resulting in innovative lighting modes for energy-saving, high-yield, and high-quality production in PFALs. This article reviewed the recent endeavors aiming to increase light conversion efficiency and nutritive properties of crops by different lighting strategies, providing economic irradiation patterns or modes for various PFALs production goals. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Role of Vertical Farming in Modern Horticultural Crop Production—Series Ⅱ)
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