Nezha Kharraz

Mrs. Nezha Kharraz


Research Focus & Metrics

Academic Career Length

4Years (2023-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
NKNezha Kharraz
Nezha Kharraz
ARAndras Revoly
Andras Revoly
ISIstvan Szabo
Istvan Szabo
Indoor farming presents a sustainable response to urbanization and climate change, yet optimizing light use efficiency (LUE) remains vital for maximizing crop yield and minimizing energy use. This study introduces an IoT-based framework for adaptive light management in controlled environments, using lettuce (Lactuca sativa L.) as a model crop due to its rapid growth and sensitivity to light spectra. The system integrates advanced LED lighting, real-time sensors, and cloud-based analytics to enhance light distribution and automate adjustments based on growth stages. The key findings indicate a 20% increase in energy efficiency and a 15% improvement in lettuce growth compared to traditional static models. Novel metrics—Light Use Efficiency at Growth stage Canopy Level (LUEP) and Lamp Level (LUEL)—were developed to assess system performance comprehensively. Simulations identified optimal growth conditions, including a light intensity of 350–400 µmol/m2/s and photoperiods of 16–17 h/day. Spectral optimization showed that a balanced blue-red light mix benefits vegetative growth, while higher red content supports flowering. The framework’s feedback control ensures rapid (97%) adjustments to environmental deviations, maintaining ideal conditions throughout growth stages. Comparative analysis confirms the adaptive system’s superiority over static models in responding to dynamic environmental conditions and improving performance metrics like LUEP and LUEL. Practical recommendations include stage-specific guidelines for light spectrum, intensity, and duration to enhance both energy efficiency and crop productivity. While tailored to lettuce, the modular system design allows for adaptation to a variety of leafy greens and other crops with species-specific calibration. This research demonstrates the potential of IoT-driven adaptive lighting systems to advance precision agriculture in indoor environments, offering scalable, energy-efficient solutions for sustainable food production.

2 April 2025 in Agriengineering
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
NKNezha Kharraz
Nezha Kharraz
ISIstvan Szabo
Istvan Szabo
The integration of cloud computing, IoT (Internet of Things), and artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming precision agriculture by enabling real-time monitoring, data analytics, and dynamic control of environmental factors. This study develops a cloud-driven data analytics pipeline for indoor agriculture, using lettuce as a test crop due to its suitability for controlled environments. Built with Apache NiFi (Niagara Files), the pipeline facilitates real-time ingestion, processing, and storage of IoT sensor data measuring light, moisture, and nutrient levels. Machine learning models, including SVM (Support Vector Machine), Gradient Boosting, and DNN (Deep Neural Networks), analyzed 12 weeks of sensor data to predict growth trends and optimize thresholds. Random Forest analysis identified light intensity as the most influential factor (importance: 0.7), while multivariate regression highlighted phosphorus (0.54) and temperature (0.23) as key contributors to plant growth. Nitrogen exhibited a strong positive correlation (0.85) with growth, whereas excessive moisture (–0.78) and slightly elevated temperatures (–0.24) negatively impacted plant development. To enhance resource efficiency, this study introduces the Integrated Agricultural Efficiency Metric (IAEM), a novel framework that synthesizes key factors, including resource usage, alert accuracy, data latency, and cloud availability, leading to a 32% improvement in resource efficiency. Unlike traditional productivity metrics, IAEM incorporates real-time data processing and cloud infrastructure to address the specific demands of modern indoor farming. The combined approach of scalable ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) pipelines with predictive analytics reduced light use by 25%, water by 30%, and nutrients by 40% while simultaneously improving crop productivity and sustainability. These findings underscore the transformative potential of integrating IoT, AI, and cloud-based analytics in precision agriculture, paving the way for more resource-efficient and sustainable farming practices.

4 July 2023 in COLUMELLA – Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
NKNezha Kharraz
Nezha Kharraz
ISIstván Szabó
István Szabó
With the rapid development of imaging technology, computing power, and algorithms, computer vision has revolutionized thoroughly plant phenotyping and is now a major tool for phenotypic analysis. Those reasons constructed the base for developing image-based plant phenotyping methods, it is a priority for the complementary or even alternative to the manual measurement. Nonetheless, the use of computer vision technology to analyze plant phenotypic traits can be affected by a lot of factors such as research environment, imaging system, and model selection. The field of plant phenotyping is developing rapidly at the moment. Image-based plant phenotyping has stated proven to be in precision agriculture, providing a quantitative basis for the description of plant-environment interactions.

14 January 2025 in Agronomy
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
NKNezha Kharraz
Nezha Kharraz
ISIstvan Szabo
Istvan Szabo
Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) offers a viable solution for sustainable crop production, yet the optimization of the latter requires precise modeling and resource management. This study introduces a novel hybrid plant growth model integrating stochastic, empirical, and optimization approaches, using Internet of Things sensors for real-time data collection. Unlike traditional methods, the hybrid model systematically captures environmental variability, simulates plant growth dynamics, and optimizes resource inputs. The prototype growth chamber, equipped with IoT sensors for monitoring environmental parameters such as light intensity, temperature, CO2, humidity, and water intake, was primarily used to provide accurate input data for the model and specifically light intensity, water intake and nutrient intake. While experimental tests on lettuce were conducted to validate initial environmental conditions, this study was focused on simulation-based analysis. Specific tests simulated plant responses to varying levels of light, water, and nutrients, enabling the validation of the proposed hybrid model. We varied light durations between 6 and 14 h/day, watering levels between 5 and 10 L/day, and nutrient concentrations between 3 and 11 g/day. Additional simulations modeled different sowing intervals to capture internal plant variability. The results demonstrated that the optimal growth conditions were 14 h/day of light, 9 L/day of water, and 5 g/day of nutrients; maximized plant biomass (200 g), leaf area (800 cm2), and height (90 cm). Key novel metrics developed in this study, the Growth Efficiency Ratio (GER) and Plant Growth Index (PGI), provided solid tools for evaluating plant performance and resource efficiency. Simulations showed that GER peaked at 0.6 for approximately 200 units of combined inputs, beyond which diminishing returns were observed. PGI increased to 0.8 to day 20 and saturated to 1 by day 30. The role of IoT sensors was critical in enhancing model accuracy and replicability by supplying real-time data on environmental variability. The hybrid model’s adaptability in the future may offer scalability to diverse crop types and environmental settings, establishing a foundation for its integration into decision-support systems for large-scale indoor farming.

13 February 2025 in Preprints.org
Verified
Preprint
Open access
PDF file
NKNezha Kharraz
Nezha Kharraz
ISIstvan Szabo
Istvan Szabo
The integration of cloud computing, IoT, and artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming precision agriculture by enabling real-time monitoring, data analytics, and dynamic control of environmental factors. This study develops a cloud-driven data analytics pipeline for indoor agriculture, using lettuce as a test crop due to its suitability for controlled environments. Built with Apache NiFi, the pipeline facilitates real-time ingestion, processing, and storage of IoT sensor data measuring light, moisture, and nutrient levels. Machine learning models, including SVM, Gradient Boosting, and Deep Neural Networks, analyzed 12 weeks of sensor data to predict growth trends and optimize thresholds. Random Forest analysis identified light intensity as the most influential factor (importance: 0.7), while multivariate regression highlighted phosphorus (0.54) and temperature (0.23) as key contributors to plant growth. Nitrogen exhibited a strong positive correlation (0.85) with growth, whereas excessive moisture (–0.78) and slightly elevated temperatures (–0.24) negatively impacted plant development. To enhance resource efficiency, this study introduces the Integrated Agricultural Efficiency Metric (IAEM), a novel framework that synthesizes key factors including resource usage, alert accuracy, data latency, and cloud availability, leading to a 32% improvement in resource efficiency. Unlike traditional productivity metrics, IAEM incorporates real-time data processing and cloud infrastructure to address the specific demands of modern indoor farming. The combined approach of scalable ETL pipelines with predictive analytics reduced light use by 25%, water by 30%, and nutrients by 40%, while simultaneously improving crop productivity and sustainability. These findings underscore the transformative potential of integrating IoT, AI, and cloud-based analytics in precision agriculture, paving the way for more resource-efficient and sustainable farming practices.