Can Robots "Taste" Grapes? Estimating SSC with Simple RGB Sensors

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Main Authors: Ciarfuglia, Thomas Alessandro, Motoi, Ionut Marian, Saraceni, Leonardo, Nardi, Daniele
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Ciarfuglia, Thomas Alessandro
Motoi, Ionut Marian
Saraceni, Leonardo
Nardi, Daniele
author_facet Ciarfuglia, Thomas Alessandro
Motoi, Ionut Marian
Saraceni, Leonardo
Nardi, Daniele
contents In table grape cultivation, harvesting depends on accurately assessing fruit quality. While some characteristics, like color, are visible, others, such as Soluble Solid Content (SSC), or sugar content measured in degrees Brix (°Brix), require specific tools. SSC is a key quality factor that correlates with ripeness, but lacks a direct causal relationship with color. Hyperspectral cameras can estimate SSC with high accuracy under controlled laboratory conditions, but their practicality in field environments is limited. This study investigates the potential of simple RGB sensors under uncontrolled lighting to estimate SSC and color, enabling cost-effective, robot-assisted harvesting. Over the 2021 and 2022 summer seasons, we collected grape images with corresponding SSC and color labels to evaluate algorithmic solutions for SSC estimation, specifically testing for cross-seasonal and cross-device robustness. We propose two approaches: a computationally efficient histogram-based method for resource-constrained robots and a Deep Neural Network (DNN) model for more complex applications. Our results demonstrate high performance, with the DNN model achieving a Mean Absolute Error (MAE) as low as $1.05$ °Brix on a challenging cross-device test set. The lightweight histogram-based method also proved effective, reaching an MAE of $1.46$ °Brix. These results are highly competitive with those from hyperspectral systems, which report errors in the $1.27$--$2.20$ °Brix range in similar field applications.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2412_20521
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Can Robots "Taste" Grapes? Estimating SSC with Simple RGB Sensors
Ciarfuglia, Thomas Alessandro
Motoi, Ionut Marian
Saraceni, Leonardo
Nardi, Daniele
Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Robotics
J.3; I.5.1; I.2.9; I.2.10
In table grape cultivation, harvesting depends on accurately assessing fruit quality. While some characteristics, like color, are visible, others, such as Soluble Solid Content (SSC), or sugar content measured in degrees Brix (°Brix), require specific tools. SSC is a key quality factor that correlates with ripeness, but lacks a direct causal relationship with color. Hyperspectral cameras can estimate SSC with high accuracy under controlled laboratory conditions, but their practicality in field environments is limited. This study investigates the potential of simple RGB sensors under uncontrolled lighting to estimate SSC and color, enabling cost-effective, robot-assisted harvesting. Over the 2021 and 2022 summer seasons, we collected grape images with corresponding SSC and color labels to evaluate algorithmic solutions for SSC estimation, specifically testing for cross-seasonal and cross-device robustness. We propose two approaches: a computationally efficient histogram-based method for resource-constrained robots and a Deep Neural Network (DNN) model for more complex applications. Our results demonstrate high performance, with the DNN model achieving a Mean Absolute Error (MAE) as low as $1.05$ °Brix on a challenging cross-device test set. The lightweight histogram-based method also proved effective, reaching an MAE of $1.46$ °Brix. These results are highly competitive with those from hyperspectral systems, which report errors in the $1.27$--$2.20$ °Brix range in similar field applications.
title Can Robots "Taste" Grapes? Estimating SSC with Simple RGB Sensors
topic Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition
Robotics
J.3; I.5.1; I.2.9; I.2.10
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2412.20521