Design and evaluation of a gripper for bunches of bananas in a supermarket environment

In this paper the first gripper that can grasp bunches of bananas is presented. Bunches of bananas are difficult to grasp by a mechanical gripper, as they vary in size and shape and are sensitive to damage caused by mechanical impact. In former research, single bananas have been grasped with pinching- or granular grippers. The gripper proposed...

Design and Validation of a Manoeuvering Caging Gripper for Cluttered Environments: A mechanical approach for grasping in cluttered environments

This research proposes and validates a novel grasping principle to be able to set caging grasps in cluttered environments. A prototype is designed making use of manoeuvering fingers which propagate along the object surface and are covered with everting belts to minimize slip and thus friction forces on the object and environment. Using several...

Flourishing Foodvalley: Pattern language as a co-design method to approach the transition towards circular agricultural systems in a hybrid landscape.

This thesis explores the possibility of circularity to regenerate the degraded agricultural systems of the Foodvalley region. The Foodvalley is a regional network organization, consisting of eight municipalities situated partly in the province of Utrecht and partly the province of Gelderland. Circularity is used to describe a way in which...

Synergising Architecture: Integrating Food System Processes with Urban Functions Towards Liveable and Sustainable Agri-Food Business Parks in Westland

Food has played an important role in shaping our metropolitan regions, such as Westland in South Holland, The Netherlands. The industrialisation and globalisation of agriculture in Westland has prioritised economy and efficiency, creating issues of liveability and sustainability. The market-driven expansion of the agri-food industry has...

Recipe for Resilience: For a sustainable agri-food sector in South Holland

Our modern food structure is unsustainable and fragile. Changes like climate crises, rising food demand, biodiversity loss, and the technological revolution will radicalize how and what we eat and produce. Whichever changes will happen, they will have an effect on the food system. In South Holland, this will happen with the transition to a...

DownScale-Up!: Downscaling global agri-food flows with an upscaled regional system

The Netherlands exported in 2017 for 91,7 billion euros and exported for even more: 62,6 billion euros(CBS, 2018). This shows the big agri-food fl ows in which the Netherlands is involved. Sadly, these global fl ows have a big impact on economic, social and environmental sustainability worldwide. For example, transport causes many emissions,...

LandBOUW: A symbiosis of sectors

The province of South Holland has many important stakeholders and drivers that impact the economy of the whole of The Netherlands. This, together with the increasing global need for circularity, is why the province has an important task in the near future to take steps towards a circular economy. To address this task, this report has chosen to...

Living Edges: Embracing adaptability as opportunity for creating living edges in the Province of Zuid-Holland

To help combat climate change, promote sustainable development and match the goals set in the Paris Agreement, the Province of Zuid-Holland wants to transition to a circular economy. To make this transition successful, the Province ought to adopt an integrative approach, addressing other elements such as socio-spatial inequality, pressure for...

Creating Awareness in the Agri-Food Sector Using a Serious Game Session: Implementing technologies which improve the traceability of the logistic supply chain

This research is conducted in order to create awareness in the agri-food sector about the effects of improving traceability with the contribution of innovative technologies. To create this awareness a serious game session is designed. At this moment the current Dutch agri-food sector lags behind if it is about innovating the logistic supply...