Most people usually don’t think of farming as a high-tech profession, but farmers are always utilizing leading edge technology.
Take self-driving cars. Farmers have already had self-driving tractors for years to maximize planting and efficiency. Combines are able to generate accurate yield maps that show which parts of the field produced the most grain. And even the irrigation pivots we see from the road can be equipped to water plants based on variations in soil and moisture.
And now for a little prognostication. A new program called Deep Learning can visually identify the types of objects within a photo. So let’s put that technology to use in…say…robot weeders. Why use herbicides when a robot can identify the difference between crop and weed? As some weeds are becoming resistant to some herbicides, this technology is inevitable.
UCDavis.edu – UC Davis developing faster, more accurate robotic cultivator
