Farmers face a number of challenges that reduce their yields. Plant diseases, water stress, and other conditions result in fewer crops brought to market, ultimately leading to economic losses. Many of these conditions are detected today with the human eye, but regularly surveying thousands of acres with human scouts is impractical and uneconomical.

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have developed robotic systems for precision agriculture, providing detailed crop monitoring on a large scale. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) can travel in swarms across a wide area, quickly surveying an entire field or orchard. These vehicles are equipped with a custom suite of sensors that can perform functions such as fruit counting, disease detection, thermal stress mapping, and other intelligence gathering functions. Providing this data allows for more efficient use of resources, early intervention to stop the spread of plant diseases, and improved crop yields.

• Regular surveying over wide areas
• Plant-specific or tree-specific intelligence

• Fruit counting
• Disease detection
• Heat stress mapping
• Yield estimation