Autonomous Modular Harvesting System for Vertical Aeroponic Farming

Abstract

As the global population grows exponentially, food consumption rises at a drastic rate. However, the limited availability of agricultural lands and inadequate traditional farming techniques have led to an emergence of alternatives such as hydroponic and aeroponic farming. Nonetheless, these systems still have limits, especially in terms of their constrained expansion when reliant on machinery, and the restricted vertical reach for human labor-driven harvesting. Therefore, we proposed an autonomous modular harvesting system for vertical farming of green oak lettuce. The structure is designed as an expandable cartesian gantry. With the initial base area of 40 x 40 cm, the system could be expanded to 120 cm in length and 240 cm in height, potentially hosting up to 96 lettuces. The system is also integrated with advanced computer vision to detect the presence of a plant and evaluate its readiness, primarily through color detection. Additionally, a specialized mechanism is installed to harvest the ripe lettuce. The system shows a notably high level of accuracy and impressive success rate in both detecting and harvesting.