All-women research team bringing wireless connectivity to Nebraska farmers

The University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s prime location in the Great Plains and Silicon Prairie make it a uniquely perfect place to bridge the "digital divide" and bring together agricultural and technological research.

An all-women team that includes Shuai Nie, assistant professor in the School of Computing, and Yijie Xiong, assistant professor of biological systems engineering and animal science and Purdue University researchers, is collaborating on a $300,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)'s National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) to bring wireless connectivity to Nebraska farmers by designing a hybrid broadband communication system for rural communities and an intelligent animal identification prototype for livestock systems.

Nie explained that while wireless networks have been around for decades, most resources have been allocated to more densely populated urban communities rather than rural areas, creating what’s known as “the digital divide.” Due to this disparity, many rural communities still lack the connectivity necessary to implement technological advancements that could improve farming practices.

“What I wanted to do is help connect the areas that were not connected before,” said Nie, principal investigator on the project. “So we’re creating a hybrid wideband communication network that can cover wherever we want to cover using both millimeter wave terrestrial networks and satellite networks.”