Agricultural Technology Report: 2013

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

New Crop Software

The technology race only seems to be getting bigger and agriculture seems to be keeping on in the race. The giant Du Pont Pioneer has developed a new crop software that can might as well be called a farmer's best friend. This new technology combines a field-by-field data with real-time agronomic and weather information to help growers make informed management decisions. The main goal on the Pioneer Field 360 is "to guide growers to better use the field data they have collected, currently and in prior years, to increase farm productivity and profitability". This new farming toy might come at a very high price but its almost priceless the service it offers you. We cant yet control the weather but we can control how we manage it.

Google Glasses hits the farms

I stumbled upon this very interesting video on how Google glasses once again have managed to attract a bigger and diverse market assuring every sector is affected positively by its new product. Farmers and the Ag sector are not an exception. This video goes ahead and interviews different farmers from different backgrounds to see what they think of the new Google glasses. We often heard a similar answer, "hands-free technology". There are many things that this new device can offer and many apps but the very main way it will help farmers is by being a hands-free device that allows them to do other things while texting, calling on the phone or checking emails as well as storing information instantly. Google has now infiltrated into the the Agriculture industry and is here to make a big change.
http://www.agriculture.com/news/technology/google-glass-hits-farm_6-ar32382

Sprayers with lasers

The Ohio State University, College of Agriculture and Environmental Science has develop a new sprayer that would save costs on chemicals and harm on plants. This new prototype is an "intelligent" sprayer system that uses a combination of lasers and computer algorithms to monitor specific field conditions and only apply the amount of chemical needed for each plant. Studies have shown that this new system can reduce the amount of chemicals used by 40% to 87% with a better spray strategy control. For now the prototype is specifically for orchards. Eventually they plan on adapting this technology into other crops. The main reason for this new technology creation was for savings in the industry. Reports say that farmers spend more than $4 billion in pesticide each year.
http://http://www.agriculture.com/news/technology/sprayers-with-lasers-save-chemical_6-ar34189/news/technology/sprayers-with-lasers-save-chemical_6-ar34189

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Advances in technology

There was once a time when farmers used to plow the land manually and it was one long hard task stretching from dawn to dusk. So they put their heads together and came up with the tractor. Cut to the 21st century and farming has gone all high-tech and is talking about GM food and agricultural biotechnology. The advances are huge but some are taking advantage of new technology to reduce cost and create more yield, but sometimes at the cost of the consumers. For example GM products are easier to take care of, require less attention and produce more yield, but you don't get the same nutrients as a non-GM product, and sometimes you can even get residue of pesticides and herbicides use in the GMO process. Health concerns have seen the soaring popularity of organic fruits and vegetables. The organic variety of food is cultivated without using pesticides, synthetic fertilizers and growth hormones. A negative aspect of where the adaptation of technology has been taken to by different companies.

http://www.ad-nett.org/

Hamster bot

The Rosphere, developed by a team at the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, looks and functions just like a hamster ball, rolling over your croplands without the use of wheels or legs. Inside the Rosphere, a pendulum rotates on an axle to make it roll and steer itself, like a hamster running up the sides of a ball. It’s perfect for navigating crops without harming them, and rolling over uneven terrain. Using GPS and wi-fi technology, the device aims to collect information about soil composition, temperature, moisture and plant health, then broadcast it back to the farmer. And if the autonomous little robot somehow gets trapped, you can take over the controls and steer it remotely.

BEE bot

Harvard engineers have unveiled a teeny-tiny bee bot, allegedly the smallest flying robot ever made. Dubbed Robobee, the goals of this little guy are broad — everything from autonomous pollination to post-disaster search and rescue. In the UK, researchers are working on an autonomous bee with a more structured goal. They want to map the honeybee brain so they can completely synthesize bee behavior — and keep the world’s food chain intact.

Herder Bot.

Australian researchers have designed a “Robotic Rover,” designed to keep cows in line like a cattle dog. It’s still in the planning phase, but Camden cows have responded well to the prototype. Rover uses 2D and 3D sensors, as well as global positioning technology, to herd cows where they need to go. According to The Land, one of the Robotic Rover’s most interesting features is its pace — it’s designed to move at cow-speed, rather than forcing cows to rush around. But you probably won’t own one of these anytime soon: The price tag is a cool $1 million Australian dollars.

Winebot

A French inventor named Christophe Millot has created a self-propelled robot for pruning vines, removing young shoots, and monitoring soil and vine health. Millot named his bot Wall-Ye, putting it one step ahead of its American cousin, the clunky-sounding Intelligent Robotic Vineyard Pruner. Key to the intelligent robotic vineyard pruner are stereoscopic scanning cameras that take 15 frames per second, scanning the entire vine and working full vine length ahead of the pruning shears.

Key to the Intelligent Robotic Vineyard Pruner are stereoscopic scanning cameras that take 15 frames per second, scanning the entire vine and working a full vine length ahead of the pruning shears.

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Grower uncertainty about future vineyard labor sources and costs has motivated development of sophisticated vineyard mechanization tools and systems in recent years. About 70 vineyard professionals gathered this spring with avid interest at Sutter Home's Delta Ranch vineyard for a demonstration of the "Intelligent Robotic Vineyard Pruner." It's the latest version of a project under development by San Diego-based Vision Robotics Corp., with assistance from several California vineyard industry investors.

Read more at: http://www.winesandvines.com/template.cfm?section=features&content=65505
Copyright © Wines & Vines

Pros and Cons of the HV-100

With the decline of laborers in the agricultural fields the demand for automated robotic machines has been on the rise. In the past decade we have seen huge changes in the Agriculture Industry that involve some kind of technological innovation. These innovations always carry with pros and cons, i will now describe the advantages and disadvantages from the HV-100.
We will begin with the pros by saying that it will cut cost while enabling other initiatives such as resource management, just in time production, and inventory control. It will cut by 50% the unit handling cost, its less susceptible to worker availability, improves worker safety/health, less susceptible to labor law changes and healthcare changes. As we can see the HV-100 brings you a lot of benefits. Now lets talk about the cons.
Like every other technological adaptation to a business you know its going to be costly. This might be a one time payment but it will be big one. The work of one robot can only do so much, so you would be force to buy more than one depending on how big is your operation. With the first model you can only use four different tasks meaning that you will still need human labor. The average battery time for each robot is only about for hours, and it takes approximately 8 hours to recharge.

How does the HV-100 work?

The complex but simple robots are aware of their simple and only task of moving plants. They are able to spot groups of plants with a censor that lets them see the plants that have been setup to be moved. Then they start moving within the perimeter given by the tape on the floor that marks the boundaries for the robots and works as a guide from one group of plants to the other. These robots can then space the plants accordingly to their setup. The robots are smart enough to follow patterns and are able to spot wholes and fill them up. They can also do the opposite and move plants that have been spaced out into a consolidated space. The other task is collection; which means that the robots can just keep bringing plants and drop them off in a specific spot. For example if you were going to load up a truck with ornamental plants you would like for the HV 100’S to drop them off right at the back of the truck for you to simply load up. Lastly you are able to set up one of the robots as a leader and set up the rest to follow him and do the same task. Here is a video to get a better picture at what they do.

What is the HV-100?

The HV-100 is designed to perform material handling tasks in unstructured outdoor areas like most of the commercial growing operations. These robots are meant to work in groups for higher efficiency and productivity. The robots work safely alongside humans and require minimal training to operate while massively reducing production cost. The size of these things is about 24 inches wide by 21 inches tall. It can work on any temperature ranging from 32 to 105 degrees Fahrenheit. It also works in the bright day light and full dark; meaning you can have 24 hour operation. Typical weather conditions don’t seem to affect them, including rain. These robots weight around 90 pounds and are able to load up to 22 pounds of weight. Under nominal conditions it can make 200 moves per hour, but the battery for each robot only last four hours and takes 8 hours to recharge or 3 hours for a quick charge. The robots use serial data capability through the use of Wi-Fi and the Ethernet to be set up for their tasks. The HV-100 tasks are:

· Spacing

· Collection

· Consolidation

· Follow me

Harvest Automation

The HV 100 is the first product made by Harvest Automation a company based of outside Boston, Massachusetts. The company developed a new approach to automating different manual labor tasks based on mobile robot technology. Harvest Automation decided to start their projects on the Nursery and Greenhouse sector due to the high number of manual workers required and the decay of laborers in past years due to political circumstances. The HV-100 came to solve a lot of problems and save a lot of money for nurseries and greenhouses. It’s just a matter of time for this sector to get adapted to new technology in order to be more efficient and cut cost to their businesses.

http://www.harvestai.com/