FORGET farm kids as gate openers, the robotics team from Australian universities were challenged to design and build robots capable of guiding themselves through a "farming area" obstacle course.
The course included distributing seeds accurately in a designated sowing area and making their way back to home base.
This challenge was part of an event sponsored by the local branch of the US-based company National Instrument's recent annual Autonomous Robotics Competition.
The event's theme, held at Macquarie University, was dubbed Go, Sow, Grow.
National Instruments supplied the teams with autonomous robot development software and related tools.
"Robotics will play a strong part in the future of agriculture," said managing director for National Instruments Oceania, Matej Krajnc.
"The competition highlighted the importance of robotics in agriculture and helped students concentrate their skills to address the needs of the sector."
High-end research into autonomous robots is underway into the practical application of the technology.
An academic journal article published through the Western Australia Centre of Excellence for MicroPhotonic Systems at Edith Cowan University looked into autonomous weed control systems - essentially robots that could patrol a paddock, spray weeds and leave productive plants alone.
The not so catchy title "Photonic-based spectral reflectance sensor for ground-based plant detection and weed discrimination" disguised a straightforward message, which was: "Due to the increased economic pressure in the agriculture industries, it is now crucial to develop and adopt new technologies that maximise the productivity and profitability of farms.
"Hand spraying is labour-intensive and time-consuming," according to the article.
"Blanket spraying wastes herbicide, reduces crop yields and increases chemical loads on ecosystems.
"An automatic real time weed detection device, where detection and treatment are performed at the same time, can yield considerable reduction in herbicide used for weed control."