IoT Environmental-monitoring System Development for Mosquito Research Through Capstone Project Integration in Engineering Technology

Abstract

Mosquitos can be dangerous because they can transfer viruses and parasites to animals and humans. These harmful agents include West Nile, dengue, Zika, and parasites such as Malaria. For mosquito research, climate data and environmental conditions can be used in studying the effect on the breeding sites of the mosquitoes and the mosquito population control. Microclimate conditions can be monitored for better resolution of the analysis and deeper understanding of the effect on human lives. In order to obtain the microclimate data, a custom mosquito environmental monitoring system has been in development. This system is based on a platform of an internet of things (IoT) system. To extend and broaden the impact in engineering education in this research area, three capstone teams on this IoT environmental monitoring systems development for Mosquito research were formed in the Fall of 2020. Each capstone team was given one task. These tasks include creating a mobile weather station, a Raspberry Pi cluster, and a water sampling drone for mosquito research. This paper provides the details of the efforts in the integration of three capstone projects for mosquito research. Moreover, feedback and surveys from the students were collected and discussed in this paper.