The IRFO project will enable companies in the region to upgrade their production facilities and to retain production in their region.
Possible areas of use for intelligent 3D vision systems are to help evaluate the status of live stock to automatically regulate food supply for feeding, to sorting of live stock. As well meat factories as slaughter houses can use 3D vision systems when meat is chopped and has to be handled and packed.
In this project we intend to develop a robot-vision platform that will enable companies to automate handling of natural goods, live stock and deformable objects. The platform contains a 3D sensor that simultaneously captures 3D shape and color in depth-video-sequences, which will allow modeling of 3D shape and time-dependent object deformation. The object models will be utilized either to evaluate live stock for growth, meat status etc., or to handle flexible objects with the robot. The modeling of internal forces of the object can predict the deformation over time and the robot will be able to grasp the deforming object correctly and to handle the object.
In addition to the direct benefits of the project for regional companies handling natural goods, is the indirect benefit for high-technology companies that will take over the developed technology and marked it towards specialized market segments. For each market segment, adapted technology must be developed to optimize the approach and to ensure proper support.
The project will develop the base technology and will support the regional companies further on, but the high-tech companies will multiply the technology towards the different market segments. Hence we foresee that high-technology companies, like the CAU spin-off Vision-N, will increase employment in the region. This technology transfer will be supported by Danish Technological Institute and the German technology transfer center of Schleswig-Holstein, WTSH.
