Agricultural Robotics: Workshop at ICRA 2008
Workshop on Agricultural Robotics:
Towards autonomous agriculture of tomorrow

Monday, 19 May 2008 - Session MW-A11
Held in conjunction with
the IEEE Conference on Robotics and Automation, Pasadena, California, on May 19-23, 2008
After the session
This half-day workshop was held on Monday the 19th of May 2008, morning (AM) session (session MW-A11). It is held in conjunction with the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation ICRA2008, at Pasadena CA, May 19-23, 2008.

NEW: Schedule and other information about the workshop can be found here.



ABSTRACT

Automation is one of the most important reasons in the improvement of farming efficiency. The maturing technologies being developed by the robotics community are paving the way for the exciting deployments of robust robotic systems in the environment of large scale farming, one that is semi-structured. Not only does this have the potential to increase the productivity and the quality of agricultural facilities, it can also significantly alter the way in which the farming industry is modeled and conducted. The future vision of the emerging trend in autonomous farming is to be discussed in this workshop and critically explored through presentation of the state-of-the-art technologies available today. Examples of such implementation on robotics technologies will be presented by the panel of speakers.

DATES

Jan 31 2008: Deadline of submissions of all contributions to the workshop.
Feb 15 2008: Notifications
Mar 1 2008: Final copies due
May 19 2008: Workshop


MOTIVATION AND OBJECTIVES
  • To present the vision of future agriculture through the robust application of robotics and automation strategies.
  • To generate awareness and interest on the role and impact of robotics and automation in agricultural applications.
  • To present the state-of-the-art technology in autonomous systems deployed on the agricultural tasks.


LIST OF CONFIRMED PRESENTERS
  • John Billingsley, Professor of Mechatronic Engineering, University of Southern Queensland, Australia, and Director of Technology Research of the National Centre for Engineering in Agriculture, Toowomba, Australia.
  • Sunil Kumar Agrawal, Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Delaware, USA.
  • Jayantha Katupitiya, Senior Lecturer, School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia.
  • Sarath Kodagoda, ARC Centre of Excellence for Autonomous Systems, Faculty of Engineering, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia.
  • Lie Tang, Assistant Professor, Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, Iowa State University.
  • Yoshisada Nagasaka, Farm Machinery and Systems Research Team, National Agricultural Research Center, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan.
  • David Johnson, robotic systems engineer, Intelligent Vehicle Systems group, Moline Technology Innovation Center, John Deere, Moline, Illinois, USA.


INTENDED AUDIENCE
  • Field and service robotics researchers.
  • Research community from robotics and automation in general.
  • Technical audience interested in the vision of future possibilities in robotics in daily applications.
  • Technical audience from the agricultural industries.
  • Industry representations who seek ideas and innovation in the commercial areas of instrumentation, vehicle automation, network communication, RFID, intelligent automation in semi-structured environment.


CONTACTS
John Billingsley (billings at usq dot edu dot au),
University of Southern Queensland, Australia.
Denny Oetomo (denny.oetomo at sophia dot inria dot fr)