Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute (RI) invented a tool called SonicBoom that can find crops like apples based on the sound they make. The research team used an array of six contact microphones placed inside a piece of PVC pipe. When the pipe touches an object, such as a tree branch, the microphones detect the resulting vibration. By analyzing the differences in the sound waves, the researchers were able to triangulate where the contact took place. SonicBoom can localize contacts with a precision between 0.43 and 2.2 centimeters.
The PVC pipe protects the contact microphones from damage. It also gives the appearance of a microphone boom, inspiring the name SonicBoom. Ultimately, the microphones could be installed inside a robot arm. The researchers used a data-driven machine learning module to develop the ability to map the signals from the microphones. To do so, they collected audio data from 18,000 contacts between the sensor and a wooden rod. Using the audio data, SonicBoom determines the location of hard or rigid objects. Changing its configuration should enable it to also sense less rigid objects, such as soft fruits and vegetables.
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