机器人正在塑造草莓采摘的未来

重庆 冉红丽

有一种新的机器人，它使用传感器和机器视觉软件来识别成熟的草莓，并能够长时间持续工作。对于面临气候变化的农业来说，这种机器人尤为重要。

主题语境：农业与科技 篇幅：337词 建议用时：6分钟

1 In a strawberry field surrounded by strawberry fields on the outskirts of Santa Maria, a pair of robots have been picking strawberries all summer.

2 Each robot,made by a Colorado company called Tortuga AgTech, rolls in the field on wheels,and then stops in front of a plant.A mechanical arm operates its sensor among the leaves; machine vision software scans the sensor data in search of ripe strawberries.If an unripe strawberry is in the way, the robot will reposition for a better angle.As the nipper-grabber (机器人的夹爪) mounted, the sensor stretched to cut the strawberry's stem (茎), and the robot then cautiously placed it in a waiting plastic container at the robot's base.

3 Tortuga's robots are designed to pick strawberries from plants grown on hydroponic (水培的) tabletops, not the ground strawberries.The tabletop system enables Tortuga's strawberry robots to work by adjusting berms' positions so that they can be poked up with robotic arms,which protects the robots from direct exposure to the elements.

4 Since hitting this field in the spring of 2021, the robots have been on their way to picking nearly as many strawberries as human pickers,and with 95%accuracy,according to Tortuga.Unlike humans, robots which don't need breaks or get sick are always ready to work and can pick all day and into the night.With wages making up so much of a grower's expense,the allure of robots'increased reliability and potential to become more cost-efficient over time is hard to resist.

5 I do think the best humans are going to be able to outperform the robot at these judgment-driven tasks,”said Eric Adamson, Tortuga's cofounder and chief executive.“But that's OK.It doesn't have to be better than every human; it just has to be better than enough people.”

6 Meanwhile, the team behind Tortuga sees agricultural robots as more than labor-saving devices.They see them as the only way that an industry facing climate change, land use and chemical regulation can adapt and survive.

Ⅰ.Difficult sentence in the text

The tabletop system enables Tortuga's strawberry robots to work by adjusting berms' positions so that they can be poked up with robotic arms, which protects the robots from direct exposure to the elements.台式系统使得Tortuga的草莓机器人能够通过调整护提的位置，使其可以被机械手臂伸入，从而保护机器人免于直接暴露在环境中。

【点石成金】本句是一个复合句。句中，so that引导的是一个目的状语从句；which引导的是一个非限制性定语从句，用于指代前面整句话。

Ⅱ.Text-centered chunks

be surrounded by 被……环绕

in search of 寻找

in the way 挡路；碍事

protect...from 保护……免受……

make up 组成

see...as 把……看作……