As spring blooms, a myriad of innovations "cultivate" anew. What happens when spring farming meets "AI"? In the quaint strawberry fields, what hides within are the wonders of "new productive forces"?
Recently, Professor Wang Xiaochan's team at the School of Engineering, Nanjing Agricultural University, has successfully developed a strawberry-picking robot with selective harvesting capabilities. Amidst the bountiful strawberry fields, you can embark on a delightful and tech-savvy strawberry-picking journey alongside this cutting-edge robot.
Wang Xiaowan introduced that due to the heavy and delicate nature of strawberry picking, a large amount of manpower is required, resulting in high production costs. In order to address these issues, reduce labor intensity, and lower production costs, the "Strawberry Selective Harvesting Robot" has been developed.
This robot consists of a tracked mobile chassis, a six-degree-of-freedom mechanical arm, an upper computer, a visual system, and other components. The robot features a precise visual recognition system and navigation system, allowing it to easily navigate through strawberry bushes and find the most enticing "ruby red gems".
The robust mechanical arm, employing advanced motion control technology, precisely positions each target strawberry, while its mechanical gripper swiftly and gently harvests them.
During operation, the robot accurately identifies the ripeness and key points of each strawberry through a vision system, which is then processed and annotated in percentage by the host computer.
For ripe strawberries, the robot swiftly responds, delicately picking them with its precise mechanical arm and end effector, ensuring the harvested strawberries remain undamaged, as if giving each one a warm embrace.
The robot can pick over 300 strawberries in an hour. While this speed might not match human pace, it can work continuously for 24 hours. At night, it simply switches on its front lights and continues its task, favoring persistence over speed.
In just a short moment, the robot fills a basket with plump and vibrant strawberries.
(All images in this article are provided by Nanjing Agricultural University.)
