Reply to Comments: A Novel Low-Cost Instrumentation System for Measuring the Water Content and Apparent Electrical Conductivity of Soils, Sensors, 15, 25546–25563
Alan Kardek Rêgo Segundo,
Marco Jose da Silva,
Gustavo Medeiros Freitas,
Paulo Marcos de Barros Monteiro,
José Helvecio Martins
Affiliations
Alan Kardek Rêgo Segundo
Department of Control and Automation Engineering (DECAT), Escola de Minas, Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto (UFOP), Morro do Cruzeiro, 35400-000 Ouro Preto, MG, Brazil
Marco Jose da Silva
Department of Electrical Engineering (CPGEI), Universidade Tecnológica Federal do Paraná (UTFPR), Av. Sete de Setembro, 3165, 80230-901 Curitiba, PR, Brazil
Gustavo Medeiros Freitas
Instituto Tecnológico Vale (ITV), Avenida Juscelino Kubitschek, 31, Bauxita, 35400-000 Ouro Preto, MG, Brazil
Paulo Marcos de Barros Monteiro
Department of Control and Automation Engineering (DECAT), Escola de Minas, Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto (UFOP), Morro do Cruzeiro, 35400-000 Ouro Preto, MG, Brazil
José Helvecio Martins
Instituto de Educação Tecnológica (IETEC), 30140-138 Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil
In this article we respond to the comments made by Chavanne et al., who have questioned: (i) the name of the technique used; (ii) the ability of the system to determine both soil water content and salinity due to potential instrument biases and choice of sensor frequencies; and (iii) the procedure used to determine temperature effect on readings presented in the article “A Novel Low-Cost Instrumentation System for Measuring the Water Content and Apparent Electrical Conductivity of Soils” (Sensors 2015, 15, 25546–25563). We have carefully analyzed the arguments in the comment, and have concluded that they only partially affect the previous conclusions, as will be discussed in this reply. We show here that the findings and conclusions previously drawn are valid and supported by the many experiments previously conducted.
