Autonomous phenotype imaging system

An autonomous system for providing consistent images of leaves of plants, comprising:

• a mobility system configured to move from an originating position to a position above a plant in a field;
• a machine vision system having a single three dimensional (3D) depth camera, the machine vision system configured to:
• a) capture an image of the plant including a leaf;
• b) remove a background from the captured image;
• c) identify and separate the leaf in the background-removed image;
• d) identify and positionally locate a tip of the leaf from the leaf-separated image;
• e) identify and positionally locate a base of the leaf;
• f) estimate a pose of the leaf, wherein the pose estimation includes i) transform individual pixel coordinates of the identified and separated leaf to world coordinates, ii) determine the pitch angle of the identified leaf, and iii) determine the yaw angle of the identified leaf, wherein (ii) and (iii) are determined based on the transformed world coordinates of the individual pixels associated with the positionally located tip and positionally located base of the leaf;
• a robotic system coupled to the mobility system, the robotic system comprising:
• a manipulator providing a plurality of degrees of freedom, and
• an imaging system having an imaging chamber defined by a housing, wherein the housing is divided into an upper case and a lower case, wherein the lower case is articulable with respect to the upper case by an imaging chamber articulation mechanism from i) an open state to ii) a closed state, wherein the articulable space between the upper case and the lower case forms an imaging chamber wherein the imaging chamber is configured to be dark when the imaging chamber articulation mechanism is in the closed state,
• and one or more cameras disposed about the imaging chamber,
• wherein the imaging system is coupled to the manipulator,
• wherein the machine vision system is configured to control the manipulator to move the imaging system in line with the leaf according to the estimated pose and thereby articulate the lower case from the open position to the closed position when the leaf is positioned inside the imaging chamber to thereby in vivo image the leaf without causing injury to the leaf.