- Email: [email protected]
The first Nitrogen Index app for mobile devices: Using portable technology for smart agricultural management
Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 91 (2013) 121–123
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Computers and Electronics in Agriculture journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compag
Application note
The first Nitrogen Index app for mobile devices: Using portable technology for smart agricultural management Jorge A. Delgado ⇑, Kevin Kowalski, Caleb Tebbe Soil Plant Nutrient Research Unit, USDA, Agricultural Research Service, 2150 Centre Avenue, Building D, Suite 100, Fort Collins, CO 80526, United States
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history: Received 13 September 2012 Received in revised form 28 November 2012 Accepted 10 December 2012
Keywords: Smartphone App Tablet Nitrogen Index Nutrient management Portable agricultural technology
a b s t r a c t Nitrogen fertilizer from organic and inorganic sources is used across the world’s agroecosystems. It contributes to higher yields and higher economic returns to farmers, and is essential for food security. However, when more is applied than necessary, significant amounts of nitrogen can exit the system and impact the environment. Appropriate nitrogen management, where the right amounts of nitrogen are applied and best practices are used to ensure higher use efficiency, is important for conservation. A recent study from the USDA reported that about 66% of US cropland was not meeting all of three best management practices for nitrogen: best rate, best time of application, and best method of application (http:// www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err-economic-research-report/err127.aspx). Nitrogen tools can help us assess the risk of nitrogen losses from a field to the environment and increase nitrogen use efficiencies (http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/sep11/nitrogen0911.htm). We need quick and mobile nitrogen management risk assessment tools that can be carried to the field and elsewhere. The first smartphone/tablet application (or ‘‘app’’) of the Nitrogen Index was released on February 26th, 2012. A PCÒ version1 of the Nitrogen Index, which can be used on PC desktop and laptop computers, is also available, so users can email the results from their Nitrogen Index app developed for smartphones/tablets in the field to their computer back at the office (or a farmer’s or consultant’s computer) using their portable device’s internet service. The Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet application can be downloaded at no cost from the Google Play™ website (https://play.google.com/store) to any phone that has the Android™ system. To find the application, the user simply needs to do a search at the Google Play website using ‘‘Nitrogen Index’’ as the search term. This new advancement in portable technology will enable the use of small devices such as smartphones to conduct an assessment on site and visit with a farmer at any given field site where a wireless connection is available. The Nitrogen Index is a quick tool, and its assessments of nitrogen loss risk are correlated with observed values. This is the first Nitrogen Index app in the world and it is the beginning of more advances to come in the field of portable agricultural technology. New advances in software (e.g., apps) and technology are bringing us to a new frontier of technology transfer, and portable technologies (e.g., smartphones, tablets) are making possible the development of ‘smart agriculture’. Published by Elsevier B.V.
1. Introduction Although nitrogen is a key engine in agricultural production and it is needed to maximize economic returns to farmers, it can be argued that nitrogen is the most mobile and dynamic element in plants and soils. This mobility allows nitrogen to leach out, get denitrified, or be lost via atmospheric pathways, and even as it is transferred due to the mineralization process. There are several re-
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 970 492 7260; fax: +1 970 492 7213. E-mail address: [email protected] (J.A. Delgado). Trade and manufacturer’s names are necessary to report factually on available data; however, the USDA neither guarantees nor warrants the standard of the product, and the use of the name by USDA implies no approval of the product to the exclusion of others that may also be suitable. 1
0168-1699/$ - see front matter Published by Elsevier B.V. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2012.12.008
ports in the literature about nitrogen losses and the impacts of these losses to the environment (Matson et al., 1997; Vitousek et al., 1997; Galloway et al., 2003). New advances in tools/models for agriculture can be used to assess the effect of nitrogen management practices on the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment while accounting for site-specific fields and properties. Delgado et al. (2006, 2008) developed a new tool (the Nitrogen Index) that can be used to help managers assess the risk of their practices in terms of potential losses of nitrogen to the environment (Fig. 1). The Nitrogen Index for stand-alone desktop computers and laptop computers is available for download at the webpage of the USDA-ARS Soil Plant Nutrient Research Unit: http://www.ars.usda.gov/npa/spnr/nitrogentools. The Nitrogen Index is a user-friendly tool that can be used by nutrient managers, extension agents, farm advisors, students,
122
J.A. Delgado et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 91 (2013) 121–123
Fig. 1. Residual soil nitrate predicted by the Nitrogen Index versus measured residual soil nitrate from US and international studies.
professors, or other users involved in nitrogen management to assess the potential risk of nitrogen losses resulting from a given set of management practices. Users can quickly evaluate changes to the given scenario and assess how the changes in management can improve the situation at the site by reducing the potential risk of nitrate leaching.
tablets are examples of portable, easy-to-use technology. These new devices can have internet connections and send emails, making it possible to easily send results from the field to computers back at the office. The number of agricultural applications, or ‘‘apps,’’ currently available is still very small, but we project that
2. New software for agriculture: The Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet app Smartphones and tablets are paving the way for the use of portable software, such as the Nitrogen Index mobile application, to facilitate communication at the field level between farmers, nutrient managers, and others. Advanced tools such as the Nitrogen Index, which can conduct a robust, quick analysis in a few minutes, can take advantage of new, portable technology to improve the communication on site with a farmer. We developed the world’s first Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet application for an Android system (Fig. 2) by adapting the Nitrogen Index 4.4 software for PC desktop and laptop computers, which was written in the programming language Java™. The PC desktop/laptop application has been modified to create an app that can run on a smartphone or tablet that has Android installed. This new application allows for nitrogen leaching simulations to be conducted virtually anywhere. Simulations are saved on the local device’s storage in the XMLbased file format .NIN. Simulations created and saved on these devices can be emailed across Wi-Fi networks. For expert users, .NIN files can also be accessed through the Android file system by connecting the device to a computer system through a USB port. Simulation files are stored under the ‘‘/Android/data/gov.usda.ars. spnr.driver/files’’ directory, from where they can be sent to a PC desktop or laptop computer via Wi-fi or downloaded directly via a USB port. The Nitrogen Index 4.4 application for PC desktops and laptops has been shown to be capable of assessing the risk of nitrogen losses from agricultural systems in the USA (Delgado et al., 2006, 2008) and internationally (Figueroa-Viramontes et al., 2011; De Paz et al., 2009). There is a need for the capability to conduct a quick assessment at the farm level ‘‘on the go.’’ Smartphones and
Fig. 2. The Nitrogen Index app runs on small, mobile devices that can readily fit in your hand or inside your pocket, making it easy to carry this powerful tool into the field and conduct an on-site analysis of nitrogen management practices for environmental conservation.
J.A. Delgado et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 91 (2013) 121–123
it will grow fast. One example of a new smartphone application related to soil science was just published by Weng et al. (2012); this new application, called GeoTools, is capable of documenting field observations for a specific location. Another example is the smartphone application developed by the University of Illinois Extension and the Illinois Council on Best Management Practices (see the University of Illinois website for more information: http:// www.news.aces.illinois.edu/news/smart-phone-application-calculate-optimum-nitrogen-rates). 3. Scenarios available for the Nitrogen Index app The Nitrogen Index app, which can be downloaded from the Google Play™ website (https://play.google.com/store), can be found by conducting a search at this site using the search term, ‘‘Nitrogen Index’’. The app can be downloaded to any phone or tablet with the Android system. The Nitrogen Index app is set up in such a way that the file format .NIN can be used by both the Nitrogen Index app installed on the mobile device and the version of the Nitrogen Index written in Java, available for stand-alone desktop and laptop computers. One of our goals was to show how new portable technologies can be used for agricultural applications such as conducting a quick assessment of the effect of nitrogen management practices on the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment. Additionally, we wanted to show how quickly the Nitrogen Index app can generate a file and communicate with software already developed for personal computers. This can facilitate the movement of information and the quick exchange of environmental and agricultural assessments. The Nitrogen Index app, which was released on February 26th, 2012 for smartphone and tablet mobile devices, can use the examples that are available for the Nitrogen Index version for stand-alone personal computers, which can be downloaded at the USDA-ARS-SPNR Nitrogen Tools webpage (http://www.ars.usda.gov/npa/spnr/nitrogentools). There are examples for the Nitrogen Index app that can be uploaded to the portable device by an advanced user. First, the user needs to install the Nitrogen Index app into a mobile device (i.e., smartphone, tablet) that has the Android system. Second, the user needs to download and install Nitrogen Index 4.4 (the version written for the PC; not the Nitrogen Index app) on a stand-alone PC desktop or laptop computer. This will facilitate the flow of information from the mobile device to the office computer and/or laptop. Once Nitrogen Index 4.4 has been downloaded, the examples from the software can be accessed. These example files are .NIN files, and are located in the following directory of the computer: ‘‘C:/Program Files/USDA-ARS-SPNR/Nitrogen Index/Example Files & Manual/’’. The advanced user could use a USB port to copy these .NIN example files and upload them to a smartphone and/or tablet mobile device. The Nitrogen Index app files are stored in the ‘‘/Android/data/gov.usda.ars.spnr.driver/files’’ directory, so the advanced user may want to copy and paste the examples into this directory of the mobile device. To take advantage of the USB file sharing between a PC and Android system, it is the user’s responsibility to learn how to enable ‘‘USB storage’’ on an Android system. Different devices may have different steps to enable this feature. This requires advanced user knowledge of the particular Android device being used. After the user is familiarized with using the Nitrogen Index app, he/she can save different scenarios on the mobile device. If the user decides to move these files to a desktop and/or laptop computer, the procedure described above can be used to transfer the files from the mobile device to the computer. Alternatively, the user could use the Nitrogen Index app menu and select, ‘‘Email the file
123
using ‘Wifi’’’ to send the file to any user who has the Nitrogen Index installed on their computer. The Nitrogen Index app includes an example of a high-risk scenario named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_SANDY.nin’’, which shows the potential for high nitrate leaching from a continuous lettuce system grown on an irrigated sandy soil. A medium-risk scenario named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_CLAYLOAM.nin’’ shows lower nitrate leaching from a continuous lettuce system grown on an irrigated clay loam soil. A third example, also a medium risk-scenario, named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_CLAYLOAM_CC.nin’’ includes improved management where a cover crop is added to the vegetable system grown on an irrigated clay loam. These examples developed for the Nitrogen Index 4.4 can be used for the Nitrogen Index mobile app, and they cover the importance of soil hydrology and management in determining the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment and how users could implement conservation practices to improve management in order to reduce environmental impacts and increase nitrogen use efficiencies. 4. Conclusion Advances in technology are moving really quickly and providing opportunities to develop new, cutting-edge tools that can help us implement better nitrogen management practices that will help increase nutrient use efficiencies at the field level and increase economic returns to farmers. Improvement in nitrogen management will help farmers achieve higher economic returns as well as help lower impacts to the environment from nitrogen losses. The new Nitrogen Index app can be a useful tool that can help us assess the risk of nitrogen losses and implement management practices to reduce this risk. This paper shows the potential applications of this new technology, and how tools that can be carried to the field and elsewhere in a pocket (e.g., a phone) to conduct quick assessments can help us be quicker and more mobile. This is a strong example of recent technological advances that have developed in the field of agriculture, and it shows how new technologies such as mobile devices are providing us the power to integrate a lot of information and quickly share it with others. This paper introduces the first Nitrogen Index app, and we anticipate that there will be more advances in computers and software in the near future that will bring us to a new frontier of technology transfer for smart mobile agriculture. References De Paz, J.M., Delgado, J.A., Ramos, C., Shaffer, M.J., Barbarick, K.K., 2009. Use of a new Nitrogen Index—GIS assessment for evaluation of nitrate leaching across a Mediterranean region. J. Hydrol. 365, 183–194. Delgado, J.A., Shaffer, M., Hu, C., Lavado, R., Cueto-Wong, J., Joosse, P., Sotomayor, D., Colon, W., Follett, R., Del Grosso, S., Li, X., Rimski-Korsakov, H., 2008. An index approach to assess nitrogen losses to the environment. Ecol. Eng. 32, 108–120. Delgado, J.A., Shaffer, M., Hu, C., Lavado, R.S., Cueto-Wong, J., Joosse, P., Li, X., RimskiKorsakov, H., Follett, R., Colon, W., Sotomayor, D., 2006. A decade of change in nutrient management: a new Nitrogen Index. J. Soil Water Conserv. 61, 66A– 75A. Figueroa-Viramontes, U., Delgado, J.A., Cueto-Wong, J.A., Núnez-Hernández, G., Reta-Sánchez, D.G., Barbarick, K.A., 2011. A new Nitrogen Index to evaluate nitrogen losses in intensive forage systems in Mexico. Agri. Ecosyst. Environ. 142, 352–364. Galloway, J.N., Aber, J.D., Erisman, J.W., Seitzinger, S.P., Howarth, R.W., Cowling, E.B., Cosby, B.J., 2003. The nitrogen cascade. BioScience 53 (4), 341–356. Matson, P.A., Parton, W.J., Power, A.G., Swift, M.J., 1997. Agricultural intensification and ecosystem properties. Science 277, 504–509. Vitousek, P.M., Aber, J.D., Howarth, R.W., Likens, G.E., Matson, P.A., Schindler, D.W., Schlesinger, W.H., Tilman, D.G., 1997. Human alteration of the global nitrogen cycle: sources and consequences. Ecol. Appl. 73 (3), 737–750. Weng, Y., Sun, F., Grigsby, J.D., 2012. GeoTools: an android phone application in geology. Comput. Geosci. 44 (2012), 24–30.
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Computers and Electronics in Agriculture journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compag
Application note
The first Nitrogen Index app for mobile devices: Using portable technology for smart agricultural management Jorge A. Delgado ⇑, Kevin Kowalski, Caleb Tebbe Soil Plant Nutrient Research Unit, USDA, Agricultural Research Service, 2150 Centre Avenue, Building D, Suite 100, Fort Collins, CO 80526, United States
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history: Received 13 September 2012 Received in revised form 28 November 2012 Accepted 10 December 2012
Keywords: Smartphone App Tablet Nitrogen Index Nutrient management Portable agricultural technology
a b s t r a c t Nitrogen fertilizer from organic and inorganic sources is used across the world’s agroecosystems. It contributes to higher yields and higher economic returns to farmers, and is essential for food security. However, when more is applied than necessary, significant amounts of nitrogen can exit the system and impact the environment. Appropriate nitrogen management, where the right amounts of nitrogen are applied and best practices are used to ensure higher use efficiency, is important for conservation. A recent study from the USDA reported that about 66% of US cropland was not meeting all of three best management practices for nitrogen: best rate, best time of application, and best method of application (http:// www.ers.usda.gov/publications/err-economic-research-report/err127.aspx). Nitrogen tools can help us assess the risk of nitrogen losses from a field to the environment and increase nitrogen use efficiencies (http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/sep11/nitrogen0911.htm). We need quick and mobile nitrogen management risk assessment tools that can be carried to the field and elsewhere. The first smartphone/tablet application (or ‘‘app’’) of the Nitrogen Index was released on February 26th, 2012. A PCÒ version1 of the Nitrogen Index, which can be used on PC desktop and laptop computers, is also available, so users can email the results from their Nitrogen Index app developed for smartphones/tablets in the field to their computer back at the office (or a farmer’s or consultant’s computer) using their portable device’s internet service. The Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet application can be downloaded at no cost from the Google Play™ website (https://play.google.com/store) to any phone that has the Android™ system. To find the application, the user simply needs to do a search at the Google Play website using ‘‘Nitrogen Index’’ as the search term. This new advancement in portable technology will enable the use of small devices such as smartphones to conduct an assessment on site and visit with a farmer at any given field site where a wireless connection is available. The Nitrogen Index is a quick tool, and its assessments of nitrogen loss risk are correlated with observed values. This is the first Nitrogen Index app in the world and it is the beginning of more advances to come in the field of portable agricultural technology. New advances in software (e.g., apps) and technology are bringing us to a new frontier of technology transfer, and portable technologies (e.g., smartphones, tablets) are making possible the development of ‘smart agriculture’. Published by Elsevier B.V.
1. Introduction Although nitrogen is a key engine in agricultural production and it is needed to maximize economic returns to farmers, it can be argued that nitrogen is the most mobile and dynamic element in plants and soils. This mobility allows nitrogen to leach out, get denitrified, or be lost via atmospheric pathways, and even as it is transferred due to the mineralization process. There are several re-
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 970 492 7260; fax: +1 970 492 7213. E-mail address: [email protected] (J.A. Delgado). Trade and manufacturer’s names are necessary to report factually on available data; however, the USDA neither guarantees nor warrants the standard of the product, and the use of the name by USDA implies no approval of the product to the exclusion of others that may also be suitable. 1
0168-1699/$ - see front matter Published by Elsevier B.V. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2012.12.008
ports in the literature about nitrogen losses and the impacts of these losses to the environment (Matson et al., 1997; Vitousek et al., 1997; Galloway et al., 2003). New advances in tools/models for agriculture can be used to assess the effect of nitrogen management practices on the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment while accounting for site-specific fields and properties. Delgado et al. (2006, 2008) developed a new tool (the Nitrogen Index) that can be used to help managers assess the risk of their practices in terms of potential losses of nitrogen to the environment (Fig. 1). The Nitrogen Index for stand-alone desktop computers and laptop computers is available for download at the webpage of the USDA-ARS Soil Plant Nutrient Research Unit: http://www.ars.usda.gov/npa/spnr/nitrogentools. The Nitrogen Index is a user-friendly tool that can be used by nutrient managers, extension agents, farm advisors, students,
122
J.A. Delgado et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 91 (2013) 121–123
Fig. 1. Residual soil nitrate predicted by the Nitrogen Index versus measured residual soil nitrate from US and international studies.
professors, or other users involved in nitrogen management to assess the potential risk of nitrogen losses resulting from a given set of management practices. Users can quickly evaluate changes to the given scenario and assess how the changes in management can improve the situation at the site by reducing the potential risk of nitrate leaching.
tablets are examples of portable, easy-to-use technology. These new devices can have internet connections and send emails, making it possible to easily send results from the field to computers back at the office. The number of agricultural applications, or ‘‘apps,’’ currently available is still very small, but we project that
2. New software for agriculture: The Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet app Smartphones and tablets are paving the way for the use of portable software, such as the Nitrogen Index mobile application, to facilitate communication at the field level between farmers, nutrient managers, and others. Advanced tools such as the Nitrogen Index, which can conduct a robust, quick analysis in a few minutes, can take advantage of new, portable technology to improve the communication on site with a farmer. We developed the world’s first Nitrogen Index smartphone/tablet application for an Android system (Fig. 2) by adapting the Nitrogen Index 4.4 software for PC desktop and laptop computers, which was written in the programming language Java™. The PC desktop/laptop application has been modified to create an app that can run on a smartphone or tablet that has Android installed. This new application allows for nitrogen leaching simulations to be conducted virtually anywhere. Simulations are saved on the local device’s storage in the XMLbased file format .NIN. Simulations created and saved on these devices can be emailed across Wi-Fi networks. For expert users, .NIN files can also be accessed through the Android file system by connecting the device to a computer system through a USB port. Simulation files are stored under the ‘‘/Android/data/gov.usda.ars. spnr.driver/files’’ directory, from where they can be sent to a PC desktop or laptop computer via Wi-fi or downloaded directly via a USB port. The Nitrogen Index 4.4 application for PC desktops and laptops has been shown to be capable of assessing the risk of nitrogen losses from agricultural systems in the USA (Delgado et al., 2006, 2008) and internationally (Figueroa-Viramontes et al., 2011; De Paz et al., 2009). There is a need for the capability to conduct a quick assessment at the farm level ‘‘on the go.’’ Smartphones and
Fig. 2. The Nitrogen Index app runs on small, mobile devices that can readily fit in your hand or inside your pocket, making it easy to carry this powerful tool into the field and conduct an on-site analysis of nitrogen management practices for environmental conservation.
J.A. Delgado et al. / Computers and Electronics in Agriculture 91 (2013) 121–123
it will grow fast. One example of a new smartphone application related to soil science was just published by Weng et al. (2012); this new application, called GeoTools, is capable of documenting field observations for a specific location. Another example is the smartphone application developed by the University of Illinois Extension and the Illinois Council on Best Management Practices (see the University of Illinois website for more information: http:// www.news.aces.illinois.edu/news/smart-phone-application-calculate-optimum-nitrogen-rates). 3. Scenarios available for the Nitrogen Index app The Nitrogen Index app, which can be downloaded from the Google Play™ website (https://play.google.com/store), can be found by conducting a search at this site using the search term, ‘‘Nitrogen Index’’. The app can be downloaded to any phone or tablet with the Android system. The Nitrogen Index app is set up in such a way that the file format .NIN can be used by both the Nitrogen Index app installed on the mobile device and the version of the Nitrogen Index written in Java, available for stand-alone desktop and laptop computers. One of our goals was to show how new portable technologies can be used for agricultural applications such as conducting a quick assessment of the effect of nitrogen management practices on the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment. Additionally, we wanted to show how quickly the Nitrogen Index app can generate a file and communicate with software already developed for personal computers. This can facilitate the movement of information and the quick exchange of environmental and agricultural assessments. The Nitrogen Index app, which was released on February 26th, 2012 for smartphone and tablet mobile devices, can use the examples that are available for the Nitrogen Index version for stand-alone personal computers, which can be downloaded at the USDA-ARS-SPNR Nitrogen Tools webpage (http://www.ars.usda.gov/npa/spnr/nitrogentools). There are examples for the Nitrogen Index app that can be uploaded to the portable device by an advanced user. First, the user needs to install the Nitrogen Index app into a mobile device (i.e., smartphone, tablet) that has the Android system. Second, the user needs to download and install Nitrogen Index 4.4 (the version written for the PC; not the Nitrogen Index app) on a stand-alone PC desktop or laptop computer. This will facilitate the flow of information from the mobile device to the office computer and/or laptop. Once Nitrogen Index 4.4 has been downloaded, the examples from the software can be accessed. These example files are .NIN files, and are located in the following directory of the computer: ‘‘C:/Program Files/USDA-ARS-SPNR/Nitrogen Index/Example Files & Manual/’’. The advanced user could use a USB port to copy these .NIN example files and upload them to a smartphone and/or tablet mobile device. The Nitrogen Index app files are stored in the ‘‘/Android/data/gov.usda.ars.spnr.driver/files’’ directory, so the advanced user may want to copy and paste the examples into this directory of the mobile device. To take advantage of the USB file sharing between a PC and Android system, it is the user’s responsibility to learn how to enable ‘‘USB storage’’ on an Android system. Different devices may have different steps to enable this feature. This requires advanced user knowledge of the particular Android device being used. After the user is familiarized with using the Nitrogen Index app, he/she can save different scenarios on the mobile device. If the user decides to move these files to a desktop and/or laptop computer, the procedure described above can be used to transfer the files from the mobile device to the computer. Alternatively, the user could use the Nitrogen Index app menu and select, ‘‘Email the file
123
using ‘Wifi’’’ to send the file to any user who has the Nitrogen Index installed on their computer. The Nitrogen Index app includes an example of a high-risk scenario named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_SANDY.nin’’, which shows the potential for high nitrate leaching from a continuous lettuce system grown on an irrigated sandy soil. A medium-risk scenario named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_CLAYLOAM.nin’’ shows lower nitrate leaching from a continuous lettuce system grown on an irrigated clay loam soil. A third example, also a medium risk-scenario, named ‘‘CA_2x_Let_CLAYLOAM_CC.nin’’ includes improved management where a cover crop is added to the vegetable system grown on an irrigated clay loam. These examples developed for the Nitrogen Index 4.4 can be used for the Nitrogen Index mobile app, and they cover the importance of soil hydrology and management in determining the risk of nitrogen losses to the environment and how users could implement conservation practices to improve management in order to reduce environmental impacts and increase nitrogen use efficiencies. 4. Conclusion Advances in technology are moving really quickly and providing opportunities to develop new, cutting-edge tools that can help us implement better nitrogen management practices that will help increase nutrient use efficiencies at the field level and increase economic returns to farmers. Improvement in nitrogen management will help farmers achieve higher economic returns as well as help lower impacts to the environment from nitrogen losses. The new Nitrogen Index app can be a useful tool that can help us assess the risk of nitrogen losses and implement management practices to reduce this risk. This paper shows the potential applications of this new technology, and how tools that can be carried to the field and elsewhere in a pocket (e.g., a phone) to conduct quick assessments can help us be quicker and more mobile. This is a strong example of recent technological advances that have developed in the field of agriculture, and it shows how new technologies such as mobile devices are providing us the power to integrate a lot of information and quickly share it with others. This paper introduces the first Nitrogen Index app, and we anticipate that there will be more advances in computers and software in the near future that will bring us to a new frontier of technology transfer for smart mobile agriculture. References De Paz, J.M., Delgado, J.A., Ramos, C., Shaffer, M.J., Barbarick, K.K., 2009. Use of a new Nitrogen Index—GIS assessment for evaluation of nitrate leaching across a Mediterranean region. J. Hydrol. 365, 183–194. Delgado, J.A., Shaffer, M., Hu, C., Lavado, R., Cueto-Wong, J., Joosse, P., Sotomayor, D., Colon, W., Follett, R., Del Grosso, S., Li, X., Rimski-Korsakov, H., 2008. An index approach to assess nitrogen losses to the environment. Ecol. Eng. 32, 108–120. Delgado, J.A., Shaffer, M., Hu, C., Lavado, R.S., Cueto-Wong, J., Joosse, P., Li, X., RimskiKorsakov, H., Follett, R., Colon, W., Sotomayor, D., 2006. A decade of change in nutrient management: a new Nitrogen Index. J. Soil Water Conserv. 61, 66A– 75A. Figueroa-Viramontes, U., Delgado, J.A., Cueto-Wong, J.A., Núnez-Hernández, G., Reta-Sánchez, D.G., Barbarick, K.A., 2011. A new Nitrogen Index to evaluate nitrogen losses in intensive forage systems in Mexico. Agri. Ecosyst. Environ. 142, 352–364. Galloway, J.N., Aber, J.D., Erisman, J.W., Seitzinger, S.P., Howarth, R.W., Cowling, E.B., Cosby, B.J., 2003. The nitrogen cascade. BioScience 53 (4), 341–356. Matson, P.A., Parton, W.J., Power, A.G., Swift, M.J., 1997. Agricultural intensification and ecosystem properties. Science 277, 504–509. Vitousek, P.M., Aber, J.D., Howarth, R.W., Likens, G.E., Matson, P.A., Schindler, D.W., Schlesinger, W.H., Tilman, D.G., 1997. Human alteration of the global nitrogen cycle: sources and consequences. Ecol. Appl. 73 (3), 737–750. Weng, Y., Sun, F., Grigsby, J.D., 2012. GeoTools: an android phone application in geology. Comput. Geosci. 44 (2012), 24–30.