Berry Gentle
Adaptive Soft Robotic Gripper for Delicate Fruit Harvesting
Problem statement
As labor pools dry up, US farmers are facing an existential threat to their way of life. According to a study by AgAmerica, the average age of U.S. farmers in 2022 was 58.1 years old and continues to rise steadily each year. This aging population accounted for 59% of all U.S. farm labor, meaning that a majority of farm workers are struggling to perform the long days of hard physical labor that take a toll on aging bodies. Furthermore, increasingly restrictive immigration policies are reducing human labor pools and driving up the cost of paid labor used to supplement these farmers. This leaves apple farmers dependent on a seasonal workforce that is increasingly unreliable and ethically complex, threatening their entire yearly revenue during the narrow harvest window. Automation offers a lifeline for this shrinking and unpredictable workforce, yet current technology remains incompatible with the delicate nature of fruit harvesting. For apple farmers, automating harvesting is impractical: most mechanisms are too rough and rigid, bruising produce which reduces their market value. Advances in robotic arm controls have brought the realization of apple automation closer as they can directly pick and handle individual apples. What is currently lacking is the ability of an arm’s end effector to grasp produce softly, without bruising or puncturing it, but with enough force to twist and pull it from the plant. Attempts have been made to allow rigid grippers to softly grasp objects by using complex algorithms and sensors, but this increases the cost of these systems and limits the scope of applications. Soft grippers, on the other hand, are designed using compliant geometries and materials that naturally conform to a wide variety of shapes and sizes, and apply far less localized stress when grasping objects. By developing a mechanically soft gripper that can delicately handle apples but apply enough force for harvesting, we would be helping US apple farmers to protect their livelihoods, offering the final piece to apple harvest automation.
