Design, development and performance study of a

polymer coated capacitive sensor for measuring

moisture content of soil

M S S Varma∗ , Jit Ghosh† , Meghana GL‡ , Avishek Adhikary‡ , Arunjyoti Sonowal§ , Susanta Banerjee¶ , N S Raghuwanshi§
and Karabi Biswas ‡
∗ Department of Electronics and Instrumentation Engineering, NIT Rourkella, India
† Departmentof Instrumentation and Electronics Engineering, Jadavpur University, India
‡ Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India
§ Department of Agricultural and Food Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India
§ Material Science Centre, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India

Email: ∗ [email protected], † [email protected],

‡ [email protected]

Abstract—In this study a new type of capacitive sensor coated Capacitive measurement technique meets many of the
with a polymer material, named as ”DQN-70” has been used above mentioned performance parameters. It is precise, simple,
to measure the moisture content of the soil. Three different fast, low cost, easy to install. It provides electrical output
polymers PMMA, BPDA-mPD and DQN-70 are taken as the which can be integrated to a sensor network for data analyses
coating material and their impedance performance has been and necessary action [7]. Most of the capacitive techniques
evaluated to select the proper coating material. Among these three
materials- DQN-70 shows the repeatable and reliable output and
uses two separate probes where the capacitance between them
hence, used for further study. The change in capacitance of the changes with the moisture content of soil [8].
probe is measured at different moisture level and converted to In this paper, a new type of capacitive sensor coated with
voltage signal. Thermo-gravimetric method is used to calibrate polymer is proposed which is a single probe cut from a double
the sensor performance. The probe was inside the soil for more
than three months and produced consistent output.
sided copper (Cu) cladded PCB board used in electronic circuit
fabrication. The polymer coating on the electrodes make the
Keywords—Soil moisture measurement, DQN-70 polymer, Poly- probe sensitive to the moisture content and at the same time
mer coated electrode, Capacitive sensing, Thermo-gravimetric protect the electrodes from the hostile environmental condition
method [9], [10].

I. I NTRODUCTION The paper is organized in five sections. Section-I is ’Intro-

duction’. In Section-II, characterization of the probes, signal
Measurement of soil moisture is an integral part of ”Water transduction circuit and the test result are provided. Section-III
Management”, and became an important area of research in discusses the result and conclusion is in Section-IV.
the field of agriculture, hydrology, agronomy, and meteorology
[1]–[3]. Irrigation water management requires timely appli- II. FABRICATION , CHARACTERIZATION AND TEST RESULT
cation of the right amount of water. Apart from that com-
petition for water, high pumping costs, and concerns for the It is already mentioned that the sensors are cut from double
environment are important for good water management [4]. A side Cu clad PCB board which makes it rigid and can be
reliable, robust and automated techniques for the measurement easily pushed inside the soil bed. Cu layers are on the largest
of soil moisture content can be extremely useful for sustainable faces of the blocks and lead wires are soldered to them. The
growth [5]. dimension of the sensors are 8 cm × 0.6 cm × 0.16 cm
with one side knife edged as shown in the Fig. 1(a). The
Literature shows an wide number of reports on soil mois- probes are then coated with three different types of polymer
ture meter and their critical review [6]. Among these, thermo- (i) polymethul-methaacrylate (PMMA) [9]; (ii) BPADA-mPD
gravimetric method is the oldest one and still used for calibra- which is a composition of 4,4-(4,4-isopropylidene diphenoxy)
tion purpose, but not an automated techniques and also labor bis (phthalic anhydride) (BPADA) and m-phenylenediamine
intensive [5]. Modern soil moisture measurement techniques (mPD) [11]; and with (iii) DQN-70 which is a proton exchange
employ electrical properties of the soil (such as, soil resistivity, type polymer comprises of Naphthalene dianhydride (NTDA)
dielectric constant, impedance, and capacitance), soil moisture based semifluorinated sulfonated copoly(ether imide)s [12].
potential, infrared rays, and radioactive techniques such as
neutron scattering, gamma attenuation and optical techniques A. Experimental Procedure
[6]. All the measurement methods have their own advantages
and disadvantages in terms of performance, portability, deploy- In a laboratory setup, natural soil is used in three hollow
ment, cost and automation. cylinders made of metals and placed on a permeable plate
 (a) . (b) .

Fig. 1. (a) Schematic of the sensor in soil bed (b) Laboratory setup to characterize the sensors

(a) . (b) .

Fig. 2. Plots of capacitance and resistance values at four different frequencies: (i) Capacitance across lead wires versus time for DQN-70 coated probe at
different operating frequencies (ii) Resistance across lead wires versus time for DQN-70 coated probe at different operating frequencies.

which allows water percolation downwards, and enclosed in a measured using an LCR meter (Agilent 4980A) at 4 dif-
tub (Fig. 1(b)). The three different probes coated with three ferent frequencies (200 Hz, 2 kHz, 20 kHz, and 200 kHz)
different polymers are inserted inside the soil. Three liters of in CP − RP mode. In each testing iteration, resistance and
water is put into the bath and after one hour water comes out capacitance values across the lead wire is recorded for 4-5
to upper level of soil from downwards. Then rest of the water days, and characteristic curves are drawn with respect to time.
remained in the bath is thrown out. After another 15 hours the As time increases, the soil moisture decreases. Hence, a probe
experimentation started. Readings were taken using precision characteristic with respect to time is an indirect representation
Impedance Analyzer (Agilent 4294A). The input of the sensor of probe characteristic with respect to moisture.
is sinusoidal signal whose frequency was varied from 20 Hz to
2 MHz to identify the most sensitive and repeatable range of In Fig. 2(a), the capacitance with respect to time have been
operation of the sensor. The characterization was carried out plotted for different operating frequencies and in Fig. 2(b), the
at regular interval. resistances with respect to time have been plotted. Both the
figures present data for three different iterations carried out
with DQN-70 coated probe. The above figures depicts that
B. Characterization and selection of the sensor capacitive sensing is more reliable than resistive sensing. We
To develop proposed soil moisture sensing system, we see, in case of capacitance measurement, the values of different
first study characteristics of different types of probes with iterations are close to each other for each operating frequency.
respect to moisture over time. Primary objectives of such But, in case of resistive measurement, the values from different
study are: (a) To understand which type of sensing is more iterations of different frequencies jumble up together and show
appropriate, resistive or capacitive. (b) To determine the no specific trend. So, it is clear that the capacitive measurement
optimum operating frequency for signal transduction. (c) To has better repeatability. Hence, it is more reliable and selected
determine which is the best suitable probe among DQN-70 for final sensing system. [Similar trends are seen for BPAD-
type, BPADA-mPD type and PMMA type. mPD coated and PMMA coated probes also, but those figures
are not shown here for the sake of comprehensibility and
compactness]
(a) Selecting the mode of sensing:
First, impedance between two lead wires (Fig. 1(a)) are (b) Choice of operating frequency:
TABLE I. AVERAGE RMSE IN LINEAR FIT OF CAPACITANCE VERSUS
TIME CURVES FOR DQN-70 COATED PROBE AT DIFFERENT OPERATING
FREQUENCY

Serial number Frequency Average RMSE

1 200 Hz 0.0743
2 2 kHz 0.0506
3 20 kHz 0.0338
4 200 kHz 0.0268

As we study the probe capacitance with time at different (a) .

frequencies, we see that response repeatability is better at
higher operating frequency than the lower ones. E.g. in Fig.
2(a), we see that capacitance versus time curves are almost
linear in log-log plane. Once each of the curves is fitted to
a best fitting straight line, we can find out the RMSE (root
mean square error) for each such fitting. The average RMSEs
(averaging over different iterations) for each frequency are
shown in Table. I (for DQN-70 coated probes). We see average
RMSE is least in the case of 200 kHz operating frequency and
most for 200 Hz frequency. This indicates that response is more
(b) .
repeatable at 200 kHz and least in 200 Hz. However, signal
transduction at 200 kHz frequency is costly and complicated,
so this work has optimally chosen 20 kHz as the operating
frequency (average RMSE at 20 kHz is not much high than
that at 200 kHz). Again, similar trend is observed for BPADA-
mpD and PMMA coated probes.
(c) Choice of the coating polymer:
In Fig. 3(a)- 3(c), the change of capacitance (C) versus time
(t) for three different probes (coated with DQN-70, BPDA-
mPD and PMMA) are presented respectively. In each figure (c) .
responses from three different iterations have been included. Fig. 3. : Capacitance versus time at 20 kHz, for different iterations for a)
From Fig. 3, it is apparent that the DQN-70 coated probes DQN-70 coated probe, b) BPADA-mPD coated probe and c) PMMA coated
are more suitable than the other two types of probes. The probe
reasons are: (i) DQN-70 coated probe has better repeatability;
their C versus t curves are more closely packed than those of
other two probes. Hence, DQN-70 probes are more reliable.
(ii) Response curves for DQN-70 coated probe are more linear
(in log-log plane, Fig. 3(a)) compared to others. (iii) Response
from BPADA-mPD and PMMA is oscillatory (ref. Fig. 3(b)-
3(c)) compared to that of DQN-70 coated probes. iv) Finally,
it is found that probe life is more for DQN-70 coated probes.
It is already reported that DQN-70 polymer coating is stable
over a year in moist ambiance [10].
Hence, in this work sensing is done using capacitive response
of DQN-70 coated probe at 20 kHz frequency.
Fig. 4. Capacitance measuring circuit

C. Signal transduction
sense capacitance and the output voltage.
The capacitance of the DQN-70 coated probe varies in the
1
range 100 pF to 600 pF, as obtained from the measurements Vin × sC2
taken by the impedance analyzer. A simple capacitance mea- Vout = 1 1 (1)
R1 + sC1 + sC2
suring circuit is designed to convert the change in capacitance
to voltage (Fig. 4). In this circuit, one end of the DQN-70 The magnitude of the output voltage can be written as
coated sensor is connected in series with a 10 nF (C2 ) capacitor C1
and the other to the output of the buffer amplifier. This circuit Vin × C2
|Vout | = q (2)
is excited with a sinusoidal wave of 4.0 peak to peak volt at 20 (1 + C1 2
+ (ωC2 R1 )2
kHz frequency, generated from a sinusoidal signal generator C2 )

using XR2206.
At 20 kHz frequency, with C2 = 10 nF, C1 in the range of
The following equations gives the relationship between the pF and with and R1 = 1 kΩ we can approximate the above
equation as:
C1
Vin × C2
|Vout | ≈ C1
(3)
1+ C2

Expanding in Taylor’s series and neglecting the higher order

terms the above equation gives-
C1 C1 C1
|Vout | ≈ Vin × × (1 − + ( )2 + ......) (4)
C2 C2 C2

C1
|Vout | ∝ (5) Fig. 6. Voltage versus moisture content of the soil
C2

Which means that a change in sensor capacitance (C1 ) due method. Finally, the output voltage versus moisture content of
to the moisture content of the soil will give proportional change the soil is plotted in Fig. 6. From the graph it is apparent
in the output voltage as C2 is constant. The RMS voltage that at higher level of moisture content the output voltage
across C2 was measured using Oscilloscope for four days at versus moisture is almost linear. There is higher deviation in
certain interval of time. Simultaneously, soil was taken from lower moisture level. This may be due to the fact that there
the same soil bed and moisture content was measured using are significant air gaps form between the sensor and the soil
thermogravimetric method. when the soil starts drying. From these graphs it is evident that
the proposed moisture sensor can measure upto 12% moisture
III. D ISCUSSION content. Starting with greater moisture level can provide more
Literature reports that determining the dielectric constant inside into this matter but with the present experimental setup
by measuring capacitance directly rather than through the use we could not moist soil with more water and is taken as future
of time domain reflectometry (TDR) systems is a relatively course of study.
new approach to soil moisture measurement [4]. In this study,
to develop the capacitive soil-moisture meter, three different IV. C ONCLUSION
probes are chosen which are coated with three different poly- In this paper, performance of a polymer coated capacitive
mers i.e. DQN-70, BPDA-mPD and PMMA. From Fig. 2, probe in measuring moisture content of soil is presented. First
it can be seen that for all the probes capacitance decreases three different polymers (DQN-70, BPDA-mPD and PMMA)
with the time and resistance increases as expected. With the are taken for coating the probe and after systematic character-
time the soil gets dried and the dielectric constant decrease ization of the probes DQN-70 material is chosen.
resulting decrease in the capacitance: whereas, depletion of
water decreases the conductivity and so resistance increases. A simple capacitive circuit is used to measure the change
of capacitance of the probe with the change of soil moisture.
Results show that the output voltage of the system follows
the moisture level of the soil measured by thermo-gravimetric
method. In higher level of moisture, the output voltage has a
linear relationship with the moisture level. In lower moisture
level a higher deviation is observed may be due to the non-
homogeneity of the soil. Further study is required in this
direction by making the soil bed with higher moisture level.
The signal conditioning circuit gives output in voltage and
hence, can be easily automated and integrated with wireless
sensor network to get the data for analysis and necessary
action. Further research work is going on in this direction.
Fig. 5. Comparison of the output of the soil moisture sensor with the moisture
content measured by thermo-gravimetric method.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Among these three polymers, DQN-70 gives better re- The authors are thankful to the SGBSI Project, 2014,
peatability as can be seen in the Fig. 3 and hence, chosen (Project Code: CEI) Sponsored Research and Industrial Con-
for further study. 20 kHz frequency is chosen looking at the sultancy (SRIC), IIT Kharagpur, India, for providing financial
stability in designing signal transduction circuit. Moreover, support to the summer interns and to carry out the research
signal transduction circuit is designed to measure the change in work.
capacitance. Similar can be also done in resistive mode, but as
capacitive mode gives better performance (Fig. 2(a) and 2(b)), R EFERENCES
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