Pick-and-place of silkworm larvae

Abstract

Most of the processes in the sericulture industry strongly rely on manual labor. In order to solve these problems, we propose to replace the current manual processes with robot automation. In this study, we propose a soft gripper that can pick and place silkworm larvae without damaging them. Gripping force measurements were performed for a rising gripper driven by a silicone belt. We measured the gripping force for various materials and dimensions of the silicone belt. In the gripping experiment, the objects to be gripped were a model and a silkworm, and six types of silicone belts were used.