A Closer Look at N-SIGHT
N-SIGHT is a decision-support web application developed at the University of Nebraska to advance in-season nitrogen management. It leverages UAV and satellite imagery together with field-level treatment data to provide real-time insights into nitrogen use efficiency. Built on the Sufficiency Index (SI) framework, N-SIGHT helps researchers, agronomists, and farmers evaluate nitrogen treatments dynamically during the growing season, making decisions more precise, profitable, and sustainable.
Chathurika Narayana, UNL Biological Systems Engineering Graduate provides "insight" at why and how "N-SIGHT" was developed.
What was the original motivation for building N-SIGHT?
Create a dynamic, data-driven platform that integrates geospatial imagery and field data, allowing for real-time assessment of nitrogen treatment effectiveness to enhance productivity and environmental sustainability, addressing the limitations of traditional static nitrogen management strategies.
From Chathurika: The motivation behind developing N-SIGHT was to overcome the limitations of traditional, static nitrogen management strategies that use fixed rates before planting and cannot adjust to changing in-season crop conditions. The Research, Extension and Education Centers (REECs) were in need of a way to evaluate nitrogen sufficiency dynamically during the growing season. N-SIGHT was therefore designed as a data-driven visualization platform that integrates geospatial imagery and field data to help researchers and agricultural professionals assess nitrogen treatment effectiveness in real time, improving both productivity and environmental sustainability.
Were there problems or gaps in nitrogen-management tools you observed?
N-SIGHT addresses the fragmentation in existing agricultural tools by integrating UAV and satellite data with field-level treatments for continuous nitrogen evaluation during crop growth. It combines the Sufficiency Index (SI) with advanced visualization techniques to translate complex sensor data into actionable insights, providing interpretable maps, plots, and tables that aid in effective decision-making.
From Chathurika: Existing tools and methods were fragmented, often offering only pre-season recommendations or lacking integration of UAV and satellite data with field-level treatments. We identified a major gap in the continuous evaluation of nitrogen sufficiency during crop growth and in translating complex sensor data into actionable field insights. N-SIGHT bridges this gap by combining the Sufficiency Index (SI) with advanced visualization to transform NDRE imagery, fertigation data, and yield information into interpretable maps, plots, and tables for decision-making.
N-SIGHT targets three user groups:
• Researchers and Extension specialists who need efficient visualization and comparison of nitrogen treatments across fields.
• Farmers and crop consultants who benefit from intuitive SI maps that reveal sufficiency or deficiency zones to guide in-season N adjustments.
• Students and educators who can use the tool as a teaching aid for precision agriculture and data analytics concepts.
Overall, it fulfills the need for a user-friendly, web-based system that converts large, multi-source agricultural datasets into understandable, site-specific nitrogen-management insights.
N-SIGHT presents UNL research field data that farmers and agronomists can utilize for learning purposes.
From Chathurika: N-SIGHT is currently in the testing and demonstration phase using data from University of Nebraska REEC fields. However, farmers and agronomists can already explore these example datasets to understand how sufficiency maps and treatment comparisons work. Future work includes expanding the platform to handle more fields as additional data becomes available, allowing farmers to eventually visualize their own field data directly.
N-SIGHT integrates both UAV and satellite imagery collected through research and extension collaborations. For smaller research fields (such as 2436S) imagery was obtained using a DJI Matrice 300 Series UAV, in the 2024 and 2025 growing seasons. Moving forward the project will be utilizing a "IF800?"Tomcat equipped with an integrated Spectra multispectral camera. These flights captured high-resolution images (approximately 12 cm per pixel) containing the Red, Red-Edge, Green, and Near-Infrared (NIR) bands required to calculate the Normalized Difference Red Edge (NDRE) index used in Sufficiency Index (SI) analysis.
For larger fields such as the SCAL field, imagery was obtained from Planet Labs satellite data. Planet’s satellites provide frequent, high-resolution (≈3 m/pixel) surface-reflectance imagery that includes NIR and Red-Edge bands necessary for NDRE computation.
These datasets were processed within Agricultural Data Management and Analytics (ADMA) using the SI Tool, which combines imagery with field sector shapefiles and nitrogen application data to calculate and visualize SI values in N-SIGHT.
Chathurika Narayana, UNL Biological Systems Engineering Graduate led the development of N-SIGHT which combines the Sufficiency Index (SI) with advanced visualization techniques to translate complex sensor data into actionable insights, providing interpretable maps, plots, and tables that aid in effective decision-making.
How to Use N-SIGHT
- Scan the QR Code below or visit this link: https://go.unl.edu/n-sight
- Explore Field Data
Select from available fields and dates to view Field Maps, Nitrogen Treatment Maps, SI Maps, Yield Maps, and related plots. - Interpret Results
- Green SI (≥ 0.95): crop is likely sufficient in nitrogen
Yellow/Red SI (< 0.95): potential nitrogen deficiency
Interactive graphs and tables help track nitrogen applications, sufficiency, and yield over time.
Take a look at some actual screens using N-SIGHT at the University of Nebraska Eastern Nebraska Research, Extension and Education Center near Mead, Nebraska
Chathurika Narayana is principal developer of N-SIGHT at the University of Nebraska, leading the system design, programming the SI-tool, and implementing the Shiny app. This collaborative project was guided by Dr. Joe Luck, an Interim Department Head and Associate Professor of Biological Systems Engineering, Precision Ag Engineer, and Associate Director of the Eastern Nebraska Research, Extension and Education Center. Also contributing to N-SIGHT development were Dr. Yein Shi, an Associate Professor of Biological Systems Engineering and Agricultural Intelligence Engineer, and Dr. Susan Vanderplas, an Associate Professor of Statistics, who contributed their expertise in analytics and visualization. Nate Thorson, NFarms Research Manager assists with updates the app.
Learn more about N-SIGHT: https://nfarms.unl.edu/N-Sight/
Questions? Contact N-Farms : cnarayana2@unl.edu