Designing Automated Solutions

Problem

What can be done to help tree-fruit growers struggling with increasing labor shortages and high associated costs?

• In the U.S., apples are one of the most valuable specialty crops, contributing about $3 billion to the tree-fruit industry.
• Pruning apple trees, necessary for profitable quality and quantity, requires about 31 working hours of skilled manual labor per acre, comprising about 20 percent of total pre-harvest production costs.

Findings

Researchers designed an automated, computerized pruning system for modern apple orchards, integrating a pruning compact robotic arm with two rotational joints and three linear joints to be able to operate in tight spaces and orient itself at almost all possible angles to reach any branch.

• Field tests assessed the performance of the prototype, finding that the cutting mechanism, or "end-effector," successfully cut branches up to an inch in diameter and at a wide range of orientations.

Impact

Automated solutions such as this innovative end-effector can provide growers with cost-effective alternatives when labor pools are limited. The introduction of robotics into agriculture reduces the burden of repetitive manual processes and opens new career pathways for agricultural workers.

Research Credit

Team

• Azlan Zahid, Md Sultan Mahmud, Long He, Daeun Choi, Paul Heinemann, James Schupp

Participating Departments

• Agricultural and Biological Engineering
• Plant Science

Partner

• Penn State Fruit Research and Extension Center

Competitive Funding

• USDA NIFA (NE SARE)

Federal and State Appropriations

• USDA NIFA Hatch Multistate Project PEN04547, Accession #1001036

Emerging Discoveries

Novel cutting mechanism devised for automated, robotic apple-tree pruning system

July 24, 2020

The first robotic cutting mechanism — or “end-effector” — for a fully automated, computerized pruning system for modern apple orchards has been designed by a Penn State research team, an early step in the creation of a technology aimed at easing challenges facing tree-fruit growers.

Published Research

Development of an integrated 3R end-effector with a cartesian manipulator for pruning apple trees

• Zahid, A., Mahmud, M. S., He, L., Choi, D., Heinemann, P., & Schupp, J. (2020). Development of an integrated 3R end-effector with a cartesian manipulator for pruning apple trees. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, 179, [105837]. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2020.105837