Urban agriculture has emerged as a crucial strategy to address food security and sustainability challenges, particularly in densely populated areas. This study focused on enhancing leafy greens’ production, specifically lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) and arugula or rocket (Eruca sativa L.), using Nutrient Film Technique (NFT) systems and automation in container-based vertical farming. The study utilized a 20-foot shipping container retrofitted to create a thermally insulated and automated growth environment equipped with energy-efficient LED lighting and precise climate control systems. The results demonstrated significant improvements in crop yields, with the NFT systems achieving productivity up to 11 times higher than traditional methods in protected horticulture. These systems enabled continuous cultivation cycles, responding to the high market demand for fresh local produce. Moreover, the integration of low-cost sensors and automation technologies, each costing under USD 300, ensured that the environmental conditions were consistently optimal, highlighting this approach’s economic feasibility and scalability. This low-cost framework aligns with industry standards for affordable technology, making it accessible for small- to medium-sized urban agriculture enterprises. This study underscores the potential of vertical farming as a sustainable solution for urban food production. It provides a model that can be replicated and scaled to meet the growing demand for healthy, locally grown vegetables.

Cultivating microgreens in central-southern Chile in unheated greenhouses offers a viable and productive alternative to growers. In 2023, two experiments were conducted in autumn and spring. These experiments involved the production of microgreens of eleven vegetable species. The tray system with the substrate was employed. Subsequently, agronomic, nutritional, and sensory perception variables were assessed. Despite notable fluctuations in external temperatures between these seasons, a diverse array of microgreens can be successfully cultivated, meeting local consumer preferences. Research indicates that microgreens grown under these conditions exhibit high nutritional quality, serving as a rich source of essential nutrients and bioactive compounds beneficial to human health. This nutritional value remains consistent across autumn and spring, establishing microgreens as a reliable and valuable food option. The observed acceptance and purchasing intentions among the surveyed population suggest a promising market opportunity for introducing these products regionally. Consumers appreciate microgreens’ quality and nutritional advantages, underscoring their potential.

Floating-tray hydroponics is expanding for microgreen production, yet evidence on substrate performance under natural-light greenhouses remains limited. This study compared perlite, coconut coir, and a 1:1 (v/v) perlite–coconut coir mixture for amaranth (Amaranthus cv. ‘Diablo Rojo’) grown at the end of summer in an unheated greenhouse (CRD; 4 replicates). Perlite significantly improved establishment and yield: emergence reached 72.6% versus 46.1% in coconut coir and 35.1% in the mixture, with fresh biomass of 297, 171, and 119 g m⁻², respectively. The proximate composition exhibited consistency across substrates (protein ≈ 32% DW; crude fiber ≈ 32% DW; crude fat ≈ 2.5% DW), whereas nitrate concentrations varied between 1300 and 2500 mg kg⁻¹ FW, irrespective of the substrate. Vitamin C and total phenolics showed no significant variation, and β-carotene exhibited only a slight, non-significant increase in coconut coir. In contrast, mineral composition was substrate-dependent: perlite increased Ca (3626 ppm DW) and Mg (1094 ppm DW), while P and Fe were unaffected; Na was higher in perlite. These results indicate that under natural-light, unheated greenhouses, bioactive compounds are mainly influenced by environmental variability, whereas root-zone aeration drives Ca/Mg enrichment and yield. Perlite-based floating-tray systems represent efficient, low-cost strategies with potentially lower environmental impact, suitable for scalable urban and smallholder microgreen production. These findings, derived from a single-season trial in one unheated greenhouse, should be regarded as preliminary yet consistent with previous studies on microgreens. Future multi-season and multi-species experiments will help to confirm and expand on these results.

Ensuring experimental reproducibility and reliable isolation of crop responses remain critical challenges in vertical farming and controlled-environment horticulture, where minor microclimatic fluctuations can mask treatment effects and compromise comparability across experiments. This study presents an intelligent, low-cost IoT-based climate management system designed as a methodological framework to stabilize environmental conditions and support reproducible crop responses in vertical horticulture. The system integrates real-time multi-sensor monitoring of temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, and CO₂ concentration with automated high-power actuation for lighting and ventilation within a unified control framework. The platform was validated using lettuce (Lactuca sativa L. cv. Ofelia) cultivated under controlled vertical farming conditions, where environmental stability enabled the reliable detection of plant responses to contrast light spectra. Crop performance was evaluated through biomass accumulation, morphological traits, and nutritional quality parameters. The intelligent control system maintained environmental setpoints within narrow ranges throughout the cultivation cycle, minimizing microclimatic variability across vertical tiers. As a result, observed differences in plant growth and biochemical composition were less likely to be confounded by environmental drift. By shifting the role of IoT technologies from simple automation tools to experimental enablers, this work illustrates how intelligent climate control can support reproducibility, scalability, and methodological robustness in vertical horticulture research. The proposed open, modular architecture provides a transferable framework for reproducible crop experimentation and production in controlled-environment systems.

In vertical farming systems, defining suitable lighting strategies is essential for improving crop productivity and product quality under controlled environmental conditions. This study evaluated the effects of four LED lighting configurations differing in spectral composition and lamp-to-canopy distance on the growth and selected quality traits of arugula (Eruca sativa Mill.) grown in a vertical nutrient film technique (NFT) system. Two light spectra were tested: white LED light and a red–blue LED combination, each applied at two distances from the crop canopy (20 and 40 cm). Two experiments were conducted in 2025 in a climate-controlled cultivation unit, and agronomic and quality-related variables were assessed at harvest, including fresh biomass, leaf development, total polyphenols, antioxidant capacity, chlorophyll index, and nitrate concentration. The LW20 treatment, representing a specific combination of white LED lighting, lamp-to-canopy distance, PPFD, and DLI, was associated with the highest fresh biomass, reaching 42.6 g plant⁻¹ in Experiment 1 and 70.9 g plant⁻¹ in Experiment 2, and with the highest total polyphenol content (38.4 mg GAE 100 g⁻¹ FW). In contrast, the red–blue treatments were associated with lower biomass production, while the RB20 treatment showed the lowest polyphenol concentration (26.2 mg GAE 100 g⁻¹ FW). Among the evaluated quality-related parameters, total polyphenols showed the clearest response to lighting conditions, whereas antioxidant capacity, chlorophyll index, and nitrate concentration were not significantly affected. Under the evaluated conditions, LW20 was the most favorable among the four tested lighting configurations for fresh biomass production and total polyphenol accumulation. However, this response should not be interpreted as evidence of white light superiority alone, because spectral composition, lamp-to-canopy distance, PPFD, and DLI were not independently controlled.

Soilless Culture has changed rapidly over the past decades, driven by advances in hydroponics, protected cultivation, environmental monitoring, vertical farming, and more sustainable production practices. These developments have also created new demands for undergraduate education, particularly in disciplines where scientific knowledge and technology evolve continuously. This study examined the longitudinal development of an undergraduate Soilless Culture course at Universidad de Talca, Chile, over more than twenty-five years. A retrospective longitudinal case study was conducted using institutional records, course syllabi, teaching materials, assessment instruments, practical activities, infrastructure records, and anonymized student performance data. Changes in scientific content, practical learning environments, competency development, and assessment strategies were analyzed, while final-grade records from 2021 to 2025 were summarized descriptively. Over time, the course evolved from a predominantly hydroponics-based approach to a broader curriculum incorporating substrate cultivation, recirculating nutrient solutions, and protected cultivation, toward practical work involving microgreens in floating-tray systems, nutrient solution formulation, substrate-based seedling systems, and the design or operation of recirculating NFT systems and introductory activities related to vertical farming. Practical learning environments expanded alongside disciplinary advances, and assessment progressively shifted toward authentic activities requiring students to apply technical knowledge, solve problems, justify management decisions, and communicate scientific information. Student performance remained consistently satisfactory despite the increasing complexity of the curriculum. The findings demonstrate that the long-term relevance of a specialized horticultural curriculum can be maintained through continuous evidence-informed revision rather than isolated major reforms. Unlike previous reports focused on individual educational interventions, this study documents how sustained curriculum renewal over more than two decades can preserve disciplinary coherence while progressively incorporating scientific advances, technological innovation, experiential learning, and professional competency development.