Automated System to Capture Carbon Cycling of a Whole Tree

Trees, in particular topical trees, have a large impact on the global carbon cycling and with increasing climate change we need to understand the feedbacks of natural ecosystems on the global atmosphere. Most researchers have focused on leaf gas exchange, however like skin all plant surfaces exchange carbon with air.
The full accounting of a tree's carbon cycle has not really been achieved. This project challenges students to try to achieve this on a real time basis: to measure the carbon uptake by leaves, the carbon stored in stems, and the carbon lost from stems, and roots and soil with one single integrated system.
The project will develop a stand alone system that will integrate carbon exchange dynamics of a whole tree by measuring gas exchange and important environmental factors such as light, temperature, humidity, and water content. The project will need to design gas exchange components for tree stems and soil gas exchange and integrate these with leaf gas exchange cuvettes, a gas analyzer (Licor 7810 via ethernet cable and MQTT protocol), environmental sensors (light, temperature, humidity, and soil water content), and stem dendrometers.
The complexity of this project lies both in making excellent gas exchange measurement from a variety of surfaces (leaf, stem, and soil) and the integration of sensor and gas exchange data. The holy grail would be if the carbon exchange from the different surfaces could be displayed on a screen at a 30-60 minute time frame, or near real-time.