Soil-engaging components of agricultural machinery can exert a direct influence on the operational efficiency, energy consumption dynamics, and pedological health. In this present study, a bibliometrics analysis was conducted on both English and Chinese literature and invention patent data of the agricultural machinery soil-engaging components in the period from 2000 to 2024. Multidisciplinary databases were also employed for the global coverage, including the Web of Science Core Collection, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), Espacenet (European Patent Office), and the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA). Advanced scientometric visualization tools—CiteSpace and VOSviewer—the research performed was utilized to realize the multidimensional analysis, including the publication volume chronologies, geographical distributions of the contributing nations, structural mappings of the institutional and author collaborative networks, the highly cited seminal works, and keyword co-occurrence/clustering diagnostics. Thereby, the current research landscape evolved on the thematic concentrations and prospective trajectories. Empirical findings demonstrated that the global academic output exhibited an upward trajectory from 2000, and then a plateau phase from post-2017, indicating a fundamental research. Subsequently, the People’s Republic of China emerged as the predominant research in both quantitative output volume and aggregate academic influence in the field. High-impact research entities—institutions and authors—were observed in the themes: the functional optimization on the components with the adaptability to diverse regional soil tillage (e.g., geometric profiling for the draft force mitigation and residue disposal), advanced material strengthening techniques (including wear-resistant surface engineering and composite material integration), tillage regime compatibility (design paradigms tailored for conservation, conventional, or reduced-tillage systems), and intelligent perception integration (sensor-enabled components in real-time load diagnostics and operational monitoring). Collectively, there was an interconnected framework driving the technological progression. Contemporary research hotspots were focused mainly on the conservation tillage (components optimization for the minimal soil disturbance and the maximum residue retention), energy-efficient and anti-adhesive design (innovative component to reduce the energy consumption and soil adhesion), high-fidelity discrete element method (DEM) modeling of the soil-tool interaction mechanics, and smart technology applications (entailing IoT integration, embedded sensing architectures, and adaptive control systems). Some technological challenges were still remained, including the insufficient material performance and inadequate multi-objective optimization (reflecting unresolved tensions between wear resistance, fracture toughness, mass reduction, and cost efficiency), underdeveloped modular system dynamic coupling (evidenced by limited integration and interaction analysis between modular components under operational stresses), and deficient environmental robustness of intelligent sensing (as the vulnerability to extreme field conditions, including moisture ingress, particulate contamination, mechanical vibration, and impact loads). Consequently, the future breakthroughs were concentrated on the novel material innovation (smart materials, nano-composites, and functionally graded structures), systemic intelligent upgrading (AI-driven predictive maintenance and autonomous adjustment algorithms), eco-sustainable development pathways (low-carbon manufacturing, recyclability, and soil health preservation), and multifunctional modular architectures (interchangeable, scalable components for the versatile field operations); These priorities were addressed to promote the soil-engaging components toward the high operational efficiency, quality metrics, and intelligence levels with the low energy intensity. A technological evolution can also provide a strong reference for the sustainable intensification and high-quality production in precision agriculture.

As an advanced non-invasive imaging technology, CT technology combines X-ray and computer reconstruction algorithms, which can accurately reveal the internal structure of objects. It has great application prospects in the field of agricultural engineering research and has gradually become one of the important technologies to promote the intelligence and precision of agricultural engineering. In order to systematically summarize the application status of CT technology in the field of agricultural engineering and analyze the future development trend of this technology, this paper summarizes the basic principles of CT technology, including equipment structure, workflow, image reconstruction post-processing technology, etc. By comparing with other non-destructive testing technologies, the significant advantages of CT technology in high resolution and strong penetration are highlighted. This paper reviews the application examples of CT technology in many fields of agricultural engineering research. For example, in the quality detection of fruits and vegetables, CT technology can non-destructively detect internal defects of fruits and vegetables, such as internal browning, voids, fibrous tissue, etc., and perform quality classification, which improves the detection efficiency and accuracy. In terms of grain evaluation, CT technology can accurately measure key parameters such as grain size, shape, internal tissue structure, and density, which can be used to evaluate grain quality and predict yield, and provide a scientific basis for breeding and planting management. In terms of stem analysis, CT technology can reveal the microstructure and physiological characteristics of stems, and provide a new perspective for studying the growth and development, lodging resistance, and mechanical strength of stems. In terms of root analysis, CT technology can track the growth process of roots, analyze the effects of roots on soil structure, porosity, and water transport, and provide important data for studying plant-soil interaction and improving soil management. In terms of soil pore analysis, CT technology can obtain three-dimensional pore structure images of soil, and analyze the geometric characteristics and spatial distribution of pores, which can be used to study the permeability, water retention, and permeability of soil, and provide scientific guidance for soil improvement and management. However, the application of CT technology still faces the problems of complex equipment operation processes, high image processing difficulty, detection resolution limitation, high equipment cost, and radiation safety. The operation process of CT equipment is relatively complex, involving multiple steps such as scanning parameter setting, image reconstruction, and post-processing. Moreover, image processing relies on professional software and algorithms, which requires a high technical level and professional knowledge of operators. The resolution of CT equipment has limitations in the application of small-volume agricultural product detection. The high cost of CT equipment and the radiation risk of X-rays to the human body have certain requirements for the installation and use environment, which limits its application in the field of agricultural engineering. In view of the above problems, this paper puts forward the development trend of CT technology applications, including enriching research objects, enhancing application effects, and optimizing technical links. CT technology is applied to the fields of agricultural machinery design, intelligent agricultural platforms, and agricultural education to develop new application scenarios. The development of multimodal imaging technology and low-dose imaging technology improves the level of intelligence and combines with artificial intelligence algorithms such as deep learning to achieve automatic image analysis. The purpose of this paper is to provide a reference for the further application and development of CT technology in the field of agricultural engineering, so as to promote the deep integration of CT technology and agricultural engineering research and its application in related research.

Rice-rape rotation is often planted in the mid-lower reaches of the Yangtze River as the main winter rapeseed production area in China. But there is also the previous crop of rice straw residue and high stubble in the period of rapeseed planting. Rapeseed direct seeding machines are prone to straw entanglement, congestion, and clogging in the rotary tillage and deep fertilization, particularly for the humid and rainy climate, while the sticky and heavy plate soil. The quality of the seedbed can depend mainly on the buried cover rate of rice straw and the surface of compartments during rapeseed planting. In this study, a combined stubble burying and anti-blocking device was designed in the rapeseed direct seeding machine suitable for the high stubble, sticky, and heavy field. Two kinds of blades were included in the cylinder blade shaft in the herringbone row, including a burying stubble curved blade and a double-edged rotary blade. The burying stubble curved blade was installed in front to directly realize the deep fertilizing shovel. The soil stubble was buried at the same time. The scraping deep fertilizing shovel in front of the region also prevented the soil and straw adherence to the front surface of the fertilizing shovel. The adjacent deep fertilizing shovels were installed between the double-edged rotary blade. Both broken stubble and scraping adjacent deep fertilizing shovels were realized in the middle of the region. The soil and straw mixture clogging accumulation was reduced in the adjacent deep fertilizing shovels in the middle of the region, in order to improve the performance of deep fertilizing shovels. The counter-rotating mode was adopted to increase the operating time between the blade and the soil, in order to realize the fine crushing of the sticky soil, the burying of the high stubble, and the leveling of the compartment surface. Archimedean spiral was selected as the blade curve of the side-cutting edge on the stubble-burying curved blade. The eccentric circular arc curve was the anti-blocking straight blade. EDEM simulation was performed on the structural and working parameters of the burying stubble curved blade and double-edged rotary blade. An optimal combination was achieved, where the rotary radius of the burying stubble curved blade was 245 mm, the angle of the tangent bending line was 27°, the angle of the bending line was 125°, the width of the working width was 75 mm, the rotary radius of the anti-blocking straight blade was 275 mm, and the angle of the sharpening blade was 15°. The experiments under two working conditions showed that the rapeseed direct seeder equipped with a combined stubble burying anti-blocking device performed the higher pass rate in the high stubble and sticky surface; There was no straw winding and clay blocking, where the levelness of the compartment surface was 19.19-22.14 mm, and the straw burying rate reached more than 90%. Compared with the rapeseed direct seeding machine installed with an ordinary rotary tillage device, the levelness of the compartment surface was improved by more than 12.01 mm, and the straw mulching rate increased by more than 27.19 percentage points. The combined stubble-burying anti-blocking device shared the better performance of stubble burying and anti-blocking. The quality of the seedbed fully met the agronomic requirements for the direct seeding of rapeseed. This finding can provide a strong reference for developing seedbed preparation devices under high stubble and sticky working conditions.