The current VineRobot prototype

While many of us may fantasize about running a vineyard someplace like the south of France, doing so wouldn't actually be all ... well, wine and roses. For one thing, you'd need to regularly walk up and down all those rows of vines, continuously stopping to check on the plants themselves and their grapes. It's the sort of thing that it would be nice if a robot could do. A robot like the VineRobot.

The robot is currently being developed through the European Union VineRobot project. Led by Spain's Universidad de La Rioja, the project involves eight partner groups from the wine-making countries of France, Italy, Germany and Spain.

The envisioned final version of the VineRobot

The idea is that the solar-powered VineRobot will move autonomously on its four wheels, using RGB stereoscopic machine vision and GPS to navigate its way up and down the rows of the vineyard.

Along the way, it will utilize technologies such as chlorophyll-based fluorescence sensing and infrared thermography to non-invasively monitor parameters such as vegetative growth, grape yield, grape composition (from which grape ripeness can be deduced), and soil moisture. That data will be wirelessly transmitted from the robot to a satellite, and from there to an app on the viticulturist's mobile device.

According to the project organizers, the VineRobot should be faster and more precise than humans doing the same job, plus it should be cheaper and allow for more flexibility than using manned aircraft or aerial drones.

The project is due to wrap up at the end of next year.

VineRobot让栽培者足不出户也能照顾好葡萄

当前VineRobot原型

虽然我们很多人可能会幻想着跑了一个葡萄园某处像法国南部，这样做不会真的是所有的...好，酒和玫瑰。首先，你需要会经常步行上下所有的排葡萄树，不断地停下来检查植物本身和他们的葡萄。这之类的事情，这将是很好的，如果机器人能做到。机器人像VineRobot

机器人目前正在通过欧盟VineRobot项目开发的。西班牙的大学德拉里奥哈的带领下，该项目涉及8伙伴团体，来自法国，意大利，德国和西班牙的葡萄酒酿造国家

的VineRobot的设想最终版本

我们的想法是，solar-供电VineRobot会自动将其四个轮子，使用RGB立体机器视觉和GPS导航的方式向上和向下的葡萄园的行。

一路上，它会利用技术，如叶绿素为基础的荧光检测和红外热到非侵入式监视器的参数，如营养生长，葡萄产量，葡萄组合物（从其中葡萄成熟可以推断），和土壤湿度。这些数据会从机器人到卫星无线发送，并从那里的葡萄栽培的移动设备上的应用程序。

据项目主办方介绍，VineRobot应该更快，更精确的比人做同样的工作，再加上它。要便宜一些，并允许比使用有人驾驶飞机或空中无人驾驶飞机更大的灵活性

该项目是由于包在明年年底