STTR Phase I: Weed Control Via Terradynamically Robust Robots

这个小型企业技术转移（STTR）第一阶段项目开发了一个机器人平台，可以在整个作物开发阶段提供自动化杂草控制。近年来，由于抗除草剂杂草的增加和农业劳动力成本的增加，杂草控制成本一直在增长。此外，对水果和蔬菜需求的增加使这些种植特种作物的农民努力寻找提高生产力的选择，同时保持费用可控。有几家公司提供蔬菜自动除草服务；然而，这些大型平台很难不损害浆果园的果实。该项目旨在开发一群可以在植物冠层下操作的机器人设备，在不影响植物生长的情况下全年为浆果提供机械杂草控制。这一技术发展将使国内水果生产能够满足日益增长的消费者需求，并允许在水果生产中减少化学品的使用，减少与除草剂有关的对农场工人和消费者的健康风险。从长远来看，这些设备可以增强其他作物的杂草控制策略，并执行不同的农业任务，如杀菌剂处理和植物健康监测，以实现自动化农业的目标，使其更加高效和可持续。这个小型企业技术转移项目旨在开发坚固耐用、离地较低、多腿的机器人，这些机器人可以在各种农业领域移动。这项技术建立在最近的工作基础上，展示了蜈蚣和类似蜈蚣的机器人在不同地形上行驶时的有效性。当协调得当时，这些机械冗余的腿系统在复杂的地形中表现出强大的运动能力，而不需要感官反馈。该项目将利用该平台进行系统的机器人实验和理论建模，以开发农业地形模拟中各种机动的协调方案。然后，这些策略将在一个硬化的机器人上实施，以便在作物地里的树冠下可靠地移动，并使用机载摄像机和计算机视觉技术识别杂草。该设备将利用低成本组件和复杂环境中的机动性原理，在这些不可预测的地形中提供保证的运动。最终，这些设备将部署在不同的农田上，在整个生长季节提供自主杂草管理，从而降低农民和消费者的生产成本。该项目将产生一个强大的机器人平台，可以提供廉价、可靠、全地形的运动，这种设备可以扩展到农业以外的美国其他部门，如搜索、救援和国防。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Phase I project develops a robotic platform that can provide automated weed control throughout crop development stages. In recent years, weed control costs have been growing due to the rise of herbicide-resistant weeds and the increase in costs of agricultural labor. Additionally, increased demand for fruits and vegetables leaves these specialty crop farmers struggling to find options to increase productivity while keeping expenses manageable. Several companies offer automated weed control in vegetables; however, these large platforms struggle not to damage fruit in berry orchards. This project aims to develop swarms of robotic devices that can operate underneath the plant canopy to provide mechanical weed control for berries throughout the year without impacting plant growth. This technological development will enable domestic fruit production to meet the growing consumer demand and allow for less chemical use in fruit production, reducing herbicide-associated health risks to farm workers and consumers. Long term, these devices can augment weed control strategies in other crops and perform different agricultural tasks such as fungicide treatments and plant health monitoring, with the goal of automating agriculture to be more efficient and sustainable. This Small Business Technology Transfer project aims to develop rugged, low-to-the-ground, multi-legged robots that can locomote in various agricultural fields. This technology builds off of recent works demonstrating the effectiveness of centipedes and centipede-like robots when traveling over diverse terrains. When properly coordinated, these mechanically redundant legged systems demonstrate robust locomotion in complex terrain without the need for sensory feedback. This project will leverage this platform and perform systematic robot experimentation and theoretical modeling to develop coordination schemes for various maneuvers in agricultural terrain analogues. These strategies will then be implemented on a hardened robot to reliably locomote beneath the canopy in crop fields and identify weeds using an onboard camera and computer vision techniques. This device will make use of low-cost components and principles of mobility in complex environments to deliver guaranteed locomotion in these unpredictable terrains. Eventually, swarms of these devices will be deployed on various crop fields to provide autonomous weed management throughout the growing season, decreasing the costs of production for farmers and consumers. This project will result in a robust robotic platform that can provide cheap, reliable, all-terrain locomotion and such a device can extend beyond agriculture to address other U.S. sectors such as search-and-rescue and defense.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.