A vacuum apple harvester under development by a California company has shown it can see the apples, pick them from the tree and do so without causing significant damage to either at a picking rate of faster than one apple per second. Now that researchers have proven the technology works, their focus is to engineer a machine that will operate effectively in today’s orchards and can be easily integrated with other orchard systems. Their goal: have the first machines available for commercial use in 2018. “There’s a lot of work to be done to build the product, but there comes […]