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68 SMT007 MAGAZINE I SEPTEMBER 2018 Precision Farming at Harper Adams, has envi- sioned the tractors being replaced by the smart, lightweight, and highly precise robots for applications including weeding, harvesting, and others. Many farmers felt that they have been served poorly by new technologies and exist- ing machinery. One of the founders of Small Robot, Sam Watson-Jones, found that a radical- ly different approach was needed to make the economics of arable farming sustainable. The smart robot they developed has come from and belongs to the farming community. Joe Allnutt, head of the technical team at Small Robot, said that they have been endeavoring to deliver pre- cision farming with a little input from a farmer and attain the level of precision for crops that were not possible before. [6] The company com- bines robotics with AI to provide a Farming as a Service (FaaS) model. This will enable the gathering of information from various robots about the crops. Using GPS and sensors, the robots will be able to offer accurate informa- tion and solutions on each crop. Robot Swarming: Team is Better than Solo According to the recent study, robots work better in groups than solo. This study forms a basis for utilizing robots for rescue missions. Researchers from Université libre de Bruxelles conducted a series of trials. They published the study, "Autonomous Task Sequencing in a Robot Swarm," in the journal Science Robot - ics. In the experiment, robots needed to deter- mine the tasks to be performed and the order in which they needed to perform in the group. Scientists demonstrated how these this can be carried out more effectively in a group of robots as compared to the robots performing by them - selves. In a rescue mission, if robots detect a victim which needed to be pulled out of the rubble, they must be able to coordinate with each other and rescue the victim. Currently, human intervention is needed to convey what needs to be done to the robots. This research offers a solution which involves modeling swarm robotics. This mod- el involves programming robots based on the social behavior of animals such as ants. Arti- ficial intelligence was used for programming robots to communicate and coordinate. They were given a simple task that needed to be per- formed in a sequence of three actions. They were set in three different points of space to complete the task. Only after completing the task did they know which order was correct. These actions became the basis for machine learning. Once they knew the correct order, they would coordinate and take decisions about completing the task together. However, the study needs further developments, but it forms the basis for smart robotics. Smart Planter: Robots to Chase Sunlight and Grow Plants Plants grow in the direction of the sunlight as it offers nutrients required for growth. The need to plant seeds in a way to get better sunlight has been eliminated. Chinese company Vincross has developed a mechanized robotic creature called HEXA that looks out for the light, takes the plant into it, and returns to the shade to let a plant thrive. The company developed a robot and designed it to hold a small plant. The robot is a six-legged structure which takes the plant to the sunlight or shade and holes itself into the ground whenever the water is needed. It is the brainchild of Sun Tianqi, founder of Vincross. Though he has explained the concept in a Vin - cross forum, it is unclear to how it determines the needs. It seems the model is under develop- ment and needs a lot of improvement. However, this is another example of how robotics is get- ting smarter in various applications. ROBO-NEEL: Andro-humanoid Robot with Feelings An andro-humanoid robot that expresses feelings such as happiness, anger, and sadness, The smart robot they developed has come from and belongs to the farming community.