Studies related to terrariums often exist in the form of research that is related to aquariums, since we can consider a

terrarium as an aquarium that contains air and plants instead of water and fishes. The IoT is often implemented in
conjunction with multiple sensors that gather data for smart feedback. Since terrariums can be considered to be small-
scale biodiversity, simulating a large environment must be implemented in such a way that certain environmental
parameters must be recorded and taken into account. In the research Aquarium Monitoring System Based on IoT [7], the
researchers successfully combined multiple environment-monitoring sensors that must lead to a better understanding of
the environment inside the aquarium. A threshold or a limiter parameter is set to determine if the change is sufficient
enough and that the system can have proper feedback that will result in an optimized environment inside the small
space for the organism with the use of the data gathered by the multiple sensors. This will also result in the system
owner having zero worries over the system being in an inadequate situation. The related study also shows the
integration between the WiFi and the cloud-computing platform in recording the data processed and gathered by the
multiple sensors present in the system. This is the goal of this research, to attain an environmental monitoring platform
with the sensors as the primary mode of data gathering, the WiFi module as the channel of data transmission, and lastly
the cloud-computing platform for recording and the analysis of the data collected.

The IoT as stated in the earlier parts has the advantage of advanced and wireless communication between devices. Since
it is the objective to have minimal to none at all human interaction with the system, having communication protocols
between devices will help in achieving this objective. For example, in aquariums, it is mainly observed that the fishes die
normally due to the inability or unavailability of the owners to take care of the said pets regularly and on a routine basis
[8]. The researchers found out that it is way more productive and better for the animals to have the IoT take over the
part that often requires regular attention such that the processes will be automated and always on schedule. This will
make things not only convenient for the owners because they will only be needing to monitor the activity through their
gadgets such as phones or computers, but also for the pets, since they will be able to receive regular attention when
things start getting automated. As stated earlier, the owners will be able to monitor the automated activities on their
gadgets since the devices will be able to transmit data from one another through IoT. This can make things foolproof and
data-driven since they can monitor the quantitative aspects of the activity in real-time and from time to time. This can
also be helpful in diagnosing the errors encountered when dealing with automated and IoT-connected devices.

From here on out, it is already stated that one of the sensors that will be employed is SGP30 (Carbon dioxide and Total
volatile organic compounds sensor), and is a revolutionary idea for a sensor that detects the levels of carbon dioxide
concentration, as this compound often plays a key role in clinical, biological, and especially environmental sciences, the
field of science this research heavily focuses on [9]. CO2 has a very low reactivity, meaning that the chance for it to
undergo a reaction with another chemical compound is very low, such that receptors based on CO2 molecular
recognition is very rare and costly these days. These kinds of sensors always play a vital role in set-ups and projects that
often deal with indoor air quality. Aside from the three sensors, the ESP8266 is quite an indispensable component of this
project as it is a low-cost and low-power system on a chip (SoC) that is intended to have Wi-Fi connection capabilities
[10]. This component receives the data and transmits it to the cloud for data analysis purposes. From there, the cloud
will be able to receive the data from the sensors transmitted by the Wi-Fi module. The researchers of the study [10] used
a cloud called Thingspeak wherein the user will be able to access the data and utilize the webpage for this purpose. The
researchers also intend to do the same implementation of this terrarium project, using the sensors to gather data from
the terrarium then transmitting the data to Thingspeak via the Wi-Fi module, and then using the cloud on a webpage and
a Twitter notification system that will be able to notify the user regularly of the terrarium’s status. This part will be
discussed further in the succeeding chapters.