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- This study shows how Twin's IOTA and virtual watchtowers are working to create a real-time, unreliable, fully trackable network for the maritime industry.
Recently, Polité cnicade València University conducted a survey and published its findings in a report entitled “IoT nodes for the monitoring and traceability of living plants in marine transport.” A follower of both technology and cryptocurrency, Salima highlighted some of the most interesting insights of the report in X's post.
This study proposes equipping the shipping container with IoT nodes to monitor important conditions during marine transport. Conditions include temperature, humidity and light. The sensor collects this data, is encrypted and sent to the middleware, and is stored securely in the IOTA tangle. This allows for real-time immutable cargo tracking without the need for a server, making it ultra-energy-efficient. As Salima summed it up, “Results: immutable traceability, no servers, energy efficiency.”
Scale the system
Before any of this information reaches the Iota Tangle, it goes through encryption to ensure that everything is secure as you move around the network. And the scale here is pretty amazing. If each container sends a message every minute, the numbers stack up really quickly.
The numbers speak for itself as the average cargo ship carries around 4,580 containers and around 5,450 ships crossing the world's waters every day. A single container generates 1,440 transactions per day. One ship produces trades of approximately 6.6 million people every day. The entire global fleet collectively pushes out 35.9 billion incredible transactions per day. Over the course of a month, that figure is 1.078 trillion transactions recorded in tangles. This illustrates the potential scale and robustness of this traceability system.
The remote monitoring platform is built on Blynk. Low-code IoT software designed to seamlessly connect your devices to the cloud. Why choose Blynk? Users can easily build mobile apps to control and monitor these devices remotely. With Blynk, it's easy to set up “custom alerts based on specific thresholds” according to the report, “visualize measurements collected by IoT nodes.” This is usually targeted at environmental factors such as temperature, relative humidity, and brightness, so users can provide complete factory control and visibility, even from afar.
There are more. The system includes tools for analyzing historical data, finding trends and improving how you manage your cargo. “The system is designed to operate with low latency, even in limited connectivity environments, thanks to the monitoring platform, middleware, and the MQTT protocol for communication between IoT nodes,” the research reads.
One thing to keep in mind is how the system handles various changes. Perfect for tracking slow and steady shifts over time. This helps save storage space. But it is not ideal for catching sudden or unexpected changes. These quick and important moments require a different approach, and an approach that can quickly process large amounts of data.
In addition, a detailed cost analysis was provided. We estimate that each IoT node will cost around US$88. This diagram includes the ESP32 TTGO LORA32 microcontroller with antennas ($31), AHT10 sensors ($2), GL5528 LDR sensors ($0.20), SEN0308 sensors ($17.50), and DS18b20 sensors ($2.10). The combination of affordability, scalability and energy efficiency positions this solution as a promising innovation to transform global maritime logistics.
