A German university are developing an autonomous wheeled robot that will have the ability to prune fruit trees.

According to an article on New Atlas, the robot, which is known as ‘Phoenix’, will be able to carry out this operation by driving around the edge of a chosen tree. During this step, it will scan the tree’s shape which in turn creates a model of the tree.

This study is being carried out by a team at the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart.

The production of the robot comes as a result of Germany’s sub-standard record with the pruning of fruit trees. According to the University of Hohenheim, 80% of the country’s fruit trees are not regularly cut.

“While the robot drives around the tree, we record its three-dimensional structure using a so-called LiDAR scanner. Similar to radar, a laser scans the environment and measures the distance to the objects”, says Dr. David Reiser, who is both an agricultural technician and a developer of the robot.

Correspondingly, AI-based software will then make a logical decision on what branches are needed to be trimmed. Once a decision has been made, the pruning is performed via a power saw on the end of an articulated arm that is able to move freely in any direction.

The robot is currently only able to perform pruning manually. However, further down the line of Phoenix’s production, Dr. Reiser and the rest of the team will look to succeed with the robot’s autonomous features and how it can cope with the varying heights of trees.

“A particular challenge lies in the high variability of the orchards,” says Dr. Reiser. “In order to be able to use autonomously working robots there, a lot of innovative development work is required.”