Robots And Autonomous Machines For Agriculture Production

Global population growth, population aging, declining labor force levels, and rising production costs pose more challenges to agricultural production. In recent years, due to the improved performance of artificial intelligence, precision agriculture, and advanced control, they have been widely used in various agricultural applications, including management, disease detection, crop monitoring, yield estimation, and crop harvesting. Robotics and autonomous machines represent a high-level application of automation in agriculture, based on precise and resource-efficient approaches to sustainably achieve greater efficiency and quality in the production of agricultural products while reducing environmental impact. Reactive technologies based on agricultural robots and autonomous machines are separate but closely related fields covering the application of automated control and robotic platforms at all levels of agricultural production. In robotic or autonomous systems, agricultural sensing and control is particularly difficult due to the complexity of the environment in which agricultural production operates. The open robot system has good expansibility, versatility and flexible operation ability. The establishment of agricultural robot control system can guarantee the reliability and real-time control. A total of 26 papers are included that explores the various ways in which robotics and autonomous machines for agricultural production address general problems.

This book provides a review of the state-of-the-art of agricultural robotics in different aspects of PA, the goals, and the gaps. The book introduces the area of Agricultural Robotics for Precision Agriculture (PA) specifically the conditions and limitations for implementing robots in this field and presents the concepts, principles, required abilities, components, characteristics and performance measures, conditions, and rules for robots in PA.

The history of Japan's agriculture is characterized by efforts to increase production and productivity. At the beginning of the 21st century, both public and private sector research has focused on developing ever-more sophisticated tools to address a wide-range of challenges facing the agricultural industry. An amazing array of automation technologies and robots have been developed in the process, to do everything from tilling fields to picking strawberries, from planting rice seedlings to autonomously weeding the paddies. This richly-illustrated volume surveys the results of these efforts, concisely and plainly presenting specific examples of the latest robotic mechanisms and practices for agricultural applications.

Over the past few decades, extensive research has been conducted on the applications of agricultural robots and automation to a variety of field and greenhouse operations, and technical fundamentals and their feasibility have also been widely demonstrated. Due to the unstructured environment, adverse interference and complicated and diversified operation process are the key of blocking its commercialization in robotic agricultural operations. Because of the development of automation techniques, smart sensors, and information techniques, some types of agricultural robots have achieved considerable success in recent years. This book intends to provide the reader with a comprehensive overview of the current state of the art in agricultural robots, fundamentals, and applications in robotic agricultural operations.

Problems of joint application of heterogeneous ground and air robotic means while performing the agricultural technological tasks that require physical interaction with agricultural products and the environment are discussed in the book. Proposed solutions for the exchange of energy and physical resources of unmanned aerial vehicles on ground service platforms, automation of the process of collecting agricultural products and ensuring the stability of the air manipulation system at physical interaction with a ground object are important for the transport and agricultural industry robotization. The book addresses the researchers investigating interdisciplinary issues of agricultural production robotization, problems of information, physical and energy interaction of ground and air robots; recommended to postgraduates and students studying "Mechatronics and robotics" and "Technologies, mechanization and power equipment in agriculture, forestry and fisheries."

What Is Agricultural Robotics Every day, we are reminded that the robot revolution is advancing. From self-driving cars to automated cashiers, robots are increasingly becoming a part of our daily lives. While most of our attention has been focused on robots in the manufacturing industry, there is one essential field of activity that they may affect more than any other. Indeed, Food is an absolute requirement that must be produced at whatever cost. As a result, we require either more farmers or new methods of producing food with little manpower. The robots are on their way to save the day. Are you prepared for agricultural robotics? How You Will Benefit (I) Insights, and validations about the following topics: Chapter 1: Agricultural Robot Chapter 2: Agricultural Drone Chapter 3: Driverless Tractor Chapter 4: Farmbot Chapter 5: Open-Source Ecology Chapter 6: Cloud Seeding Chapter 7: Aerial Seeding Chapter 8: Mechanized Agriculture Chapter 9: Agricultural Machinery Chapter 10: Precision Agriculture Chapter 11: Information and Communications Technology in Agriculture Chapter 12: Machine Vision (II) Answering the public top questions about agricultural robotics. (III) Real world examples for the usage of agricultural robotics in many fields. (IV) 17 appendices to explain, briefly, 266 emerging technology in each industry to have 360-degree full understanding of agricultural robotics' technologies. Who This Book Is For Professionals, undergraduate and graduate students, enthusiasts, hobbyists, and those who want to go beyond basic knowledge or information for any kind of agricultural robotics.

Over the past century, mechanization has been an important means for optimizing resource utilization, improving worker health and safety and reducing labor requirements in farming while increasing productivity and quality of 4F (Food, Fuel, Fiber, Feed). Recognizing this contribution, agricultural mechanization was considered as one of the top ten engineering achievements of 20th century by the National Academy of Engineering. Accordingly farming communities have adopted increasing level of automation and robotics to further improve the precision management of crops (including input resources), increase productivity and reduce farm labor beyond what has been possible with conventional mechanization technologies. It is more important than ever to continue to develop and adopt novel automation and robotic solutions into farming so that some of the most complex agricultural tasks, which require huge amount of seasonal labor such as fruit and vegetable harvesting, could be automated while meeting the rapidly increasing need for 4F. In addition, continual innovation in and adoption of agricultural automation and robotic technologies is essential to minimize the use of depleting resources including water, minerals and other chemicals so that sufficient amount of safe and healthy food can be produced for current generation while not compromising the potential for the future generation. This book aims at presenting the fundamental principles of various aspects of automation and robotics as they relate to production agriculture (the branch of agriculture dealing with farming operations from field preparation to seeding, to harvesting and field logistics). The building blocks of agricultural automation and robotics that are discussed in the book include sensing and machine vision, control, guidance, manipulation and end-effector technologies. The fundamentals and operating principles of these technologies are explained with examples from cutting-edge research and development currently going on around the word. This book brings together scientists, engineers, students and professionals working in these and related technologies to present their latest examples of agricultural automation and robotics research, innovation and development while explaining the fundamentals of the technology. The book, therefore, benefits those who wish to develop novel agricultural engineering solutions and/or to adopt them in the future. .

The farming and agricultural robotics industries are inextricably linked. This connection is reinforced every year at the FIRA International Forum of Agricultural Robots, where, inevitably, there are new players and new problems, bigger goals and better solutions. This book is a journey into the state of the art of the industry in 2020, followed by 27 agricultural robot information sheets.