High resolution lenses for machine vision — standard and custom lens design
Robotic Technologies Move Into Agricultural Fields
High Resolution Lenses for machine vision, instrumentation, inspection and vibration-sensitive applications. Standard and custom hi-res lens assemblies.
Robotic Technologies Move Into Agriculture
Just as robotic technology has made its mark in manufacturing processes, it has also moved into the agricultural field. Robotic technology can help free farmers from backbreaking, repetitive tasks such as thinning and cutting cabbage fields or even weeding long rows of fruits and vegetables. The technology could make the prediction of a shortage of labor on farms not as daunting as once feared if farmers embrace the technological advances that are being proposed.
There is a robotic technology being developed, called the Lettuce Bot, that incorporates a computer-vision algorithm to compare snapshots of lettuce rows. The camera is mounted on a tractor and then tied into a database that houses more than one million images of lettuce and the robotic technology is programmed to distinguish between heads of lettuce and weeds.
After the machine vision component identifies either a head of lettuce or weeds that are growing too closely together, it releases a dose of fertilizer, which when used in high concentrations can act as a potent weed killer. The fertilizer kills the weeds, but doesn’t harm the plant and in fact offers the plant an extra burst of fertilizer to nourish it and aid its growth.
The technology is slated for limited introduction into the agricultural realm sometime in 2013. Additionally, the technology being introduced by Blue River will also offer a robotic arm component that can kill weeds with a blade rather than fertilizer; this is being introduced to appeal to organic farmers.
Universe Optics provides high Resolution Lenses for machine vision, instrumentation, inspection and vibration-sensitive applications. Standard and custom hi-res lens assemblies for use in machine vision, inspection and related systems.