1. Do we have any technology (independent of cost) existing today to have a fully automated farm? Meaning, set everything up and it'll just spit out yield? This would include taking into account weather, planting, removing weeds, etc. The input into this "system" of course would be the "ingredients" such as soil, soil, and of course, sunlight. [1]
2. What's the maximum yield we can get out of an acre these days? If I wanted to buy, say, an acre (for food) and start a small town in southern United States and feed 1000 people easily, is that possible? For simplicity let's say everyone is vegan.
[1] Here's a snippet of research I've done that may be of interest to readers.
Air and soil: There's been some advancements in sensors which is an obvious requisite towards the auto-farm. However I haven't read anything recently about this. Most recent was (http://gizmodo.com/swarms-of-soil-sensors-may-help-farmers-water-smarter-d-1713098054)
Robotics: I know they (farm bots) exist (http://modernfarmer.com/2013/08/5-robots-on-the-farm/), but I haven't heard of them actually being more productive than existing high-yield solutions. I do think in the end they'll be superior.
The single most advanced modern farm I've heard of is: http://seedstock.com/2013/01/24/indoor-grower/. Anyone know of anything that surpasses this? Just making farming (perhaps one of the most labor intensive things you can do these days) less of a burden will prove to be a game changer (e.g. you may find a single person willing and able to maintain an entire one acre farm).