The shortage of natural pollinators , such as bee , is endanger global intellectual nourishment output around the world . Researchers at West Virginia University have come up with a plan B to this downslope in pollinators by creating a robotic pollinator .
A squad led by Yu Gu , associate professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering , is creating StickBug , a six - armed automaton to help man in greenhouse environments by pollinating various crop .
Gu ’s robotic pollenation proposal submitted to the National Robotics Initiative was selected for $ 750,000 in financial support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture . Joining Gu on the labor are Jason Gross , associate prof and associate chair for research , mechanical , and aerospace engineering , and Nicole Waterland , associate prof of gardening and director of controlled environments .
This is a computer - generate image of StickBug , a six - arm robot to attend to homo in nursery environment by pollinating various crop . ( WVU Robotics )
“ StickBug maps out the environment and once the robot has a general idea of the environs , it will build up a more elaborate single-valued function of the plant and knows where the flower are and which flower needs to be pollenate , ” Gu said . “ It will make a plan on what to do . Then , it will get close to each of the plants , commence swinging its six weapons system and lead off pollinating . ”
Arms for multiple purposesAccording to Gu , the six arms are mainly for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the robot . For lesson , some flowers could be in hard - to - reach place and the robot may want to use two blazonry ; one arm for catch the branch , and the other branch to cross-pollinate the flower .
The robot is responsible for the time - have labor of flower review , mapping , pollination , and development tracking , allowing agriculturist the freedom to focus on other greenhouse tasks like planting , irrigation , and pest control .
“ The focus of the end product is to seek to lower the barrier of entry to make it more practical , so that growers would require to adopt a machinelike engineering science in their greenhouse operation , ” Gross said .
The long - term goals for this automaton are to care for individual crops efficiently , improve food for thought security during insect decay , support indoor agriculture , and provide services beyond what louse can do such as collecting data on the crop .
CropsEvaluation of StickBug ’s pollenation effectiveness will be perform in the WVU Evansdale Greenhouse using blackberries and tomatoes . These craw were chosen because both are sufficiently popular in the United States and throw economic economic value .
An animation helps illustrate the potential drop of StickBug . ( WVU Robotics )
“ Tomato is probably one of the most economically important crops in the area and it also needs help for pollenation , ” Gu said . “ Another major rationality is that tomato plants grow class - round , and thus there are always tomato flowers to do experiments on . Greenhouse tomatoes can be produce for 11 months out of the yr , so there ’s a continual pauperism for pollinators , ” Waterland said .
Waterland noted that Lycopersicon esculentum and blackberry bush crops are both being produced more and more in high tunnels and greenhouses , where researchers see likely utilization of the robotic pollination system .
According to the USDA Forest Service , about 80 % of all flowering plants require assistance from brute for pollination and , without pollinators , many crops can not propagate . With the help of automatonlike pollinators , Gu pronounce agriculturist can subdue the deficit of pollinator and obtain higher profit chance by planning flexible pollination schedules independent from the activity of pollinators .
prison term is ripe“Agriculture is a field that is very right for to-do with robotics and automation , ” Gross said . “ The hope is that a lot of those challenges with sensing and manipulation and interacting with the works will be more widely applicable to a lot of different robotics agriculture applications . ”
While West Virginia is a mainly rural state , it is not an agrarian nation , mean that it imports more food than it produces . Gu hop that this robotic pollenation technology can corroborate more people in the state to have their own venture in agriculture .
For WVU specifically , Gross , Gu , and Waterland order that the robot pollinator also provides educational opportunity for students . “ WVU allows us to do cutting - sharpness research , ” Gu said . “ This undertaking provides an chance for student to do both hands - on and theoretical research in robotics as well . ”
“ In addition to allowing us to guide enquiry and diffuse research finding to peer - reviewed publications , we ’ll be funding alumna scholarly person and undergraduate worker off of this project , ” Waterland said . “ We ’ll be utilizing the grant funding from this labor to educate the next generation of faculty and researchers , strengthening the development of these somebody come out of universities . ”
Engineering programsAccording to Gu , specific programme will also be developed to integrate the engineering and skilled labor training area so that next training aligns with the rapidly further use of robotics .
“ The great affair about this project is it really encourage these interdisciplinary , intercollege collaboration , ” Waterland said . “ It build a handsome , whole picture for the students and for the inquiry . The ultimate destination is that this in reality goes into the industry and that we develop a machinelike weapons platform that can be used in the agricultural discipline . ”
For more information : West Virginia Universitywww.wvu.edu
