Advent Innovations LTD Co will develop an artificial intelligence-driven peach blossom thinning software called A-Eye through this $174,021 Project Grant from the US Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture. The grant falls under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Program/Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) Program (CFDA 10.212), which aims to stimulate technological innovation to build a strong national economy by supporting scientific excellence.
Specifically, A-Eye will utilize machine vision and advanced machine learning techniques to actively identify productive peach blossoms and determine bloom density and color distribution in real-time. This will guide the thinning process and be integrated with a portable device. The software seeks to improve the efficiency and accuracy of peach thinning over manual and mechanical methods, with the goal of reducing labor costs by 60% and increasing fruit size and farm profitability. Development will take place in collaboration with the University of South Carolina and Titan Farms in Ridge Spring, South Carolina, from July 1, 2023 to February 29, 2024.
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