The 'SCV' team, composed of undergraduate students from the Department of Bioindustrial Machinery Engineering (supervising professor 양명균), won the Excellence Award (Rural Development Administration Commissioner’s Award) at the 6th KSAM Agricultural Robot Competition, organized by the Korean Society of Agricultural Machinery, demonstrating Jeonbuk National University (JBNU)’s competitiveness in agricultural AI and robotics nationwide.

The competition is a leading domestic contest that comprehensively evaluates AI-based perception technologies and robots' physical control capabilities (Physical AI). It centered on tasks in greenhouse environments in which robots autonomously navigate, detect anomalies, assess crop growth conditions to determine ripeness, and then perform return navigation.

Beginning with document screening in late July and following preliminary rounds, the final competition held on October 29 at the Jeonnam Agricultural Research and Extension Services drew undergraduate and graduate student teams from major universities nationwide and featured intense competition.

The JBNU 'SCV' team developed its own AI image-recognition and sensor-fusion navigation algorithms, demonstrating a high level of technical maturity. Unlike some teams that chose a simulation-focused approach to achieve short-term performance gains, the SCV team attracted the judges' attention with a field-centered Physical AI design that faithfully reflected real agricultural conditions. Even though the team was mainly composed of second-year students, they fully implemented the driving, perception, and response processes and earned the Excellence Award by a narrow margin behind the top teams.

Team leader 박은수 said, "Thanks to Professor 양명균’s careful guidance and the team members' dedication, we were able to produce a highly refined result in a short period." 김원진, who developed the navigation algorithm, said, "By designing the AI perception and control algorithms myself, I was able to implement the process by which the robot makes judgments and moves autonomously in a real environment." 이아린, who was in charge of the communication system, said, "We built real-time communication between the robot and a laptop, and although there were many trials and errors, that process allowed us to grow."

Supervising professor 양명균, Professor in the Department of Bioindustrial Machinery Engineering at JBNU, said, "I am proud that the efforts have borne fruit; the team is composed largely of passionate and excellent undergraduate researchers." He added, "Going forward, we will strengthen AI–robotics convergence education and practice-centered Physical AI research to nurture the next generation of agricultural technology talent."

Meanwhile, the 'SCV' team is composed of JBNU Department of Bioindustrial Machinery Engineering students 김원진, 김태경, 박은수, 심승준, 양지현, and 이아린. Most are undergraduate researchers affiliated with ADILAB (Laboratory for Agricultural Digitalization and Intelligence).