Robots Master Permaculture: ETH Zürich 2025 Innovation

This article reports on the 2025 Innovation Project at ETH Zürich in which mechanical engineering students designed, built, programmed and tested autonomous miniature robots to perform tasks in a model-scale permaculture garden. The piece explains that the Innovation Project is an established component of the Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering curriculum intended to teach students how to translate initial sketches into functioning technology through iterative design, system integration and software development. Approximately 550 students participate annually, working in small teams to tackle complex technical challenges while being coached by previous participants; in 2025 ten teams qualified for the final competition. The core technical challenge for the year—framed under the theme “Back to the Roots”—required teams to produce autonomous vehicles constrained in size and weight that could operate on a regulation model-scale track to sow winter onions, harvest apples and plums from distinct trees, and deliver sorted fruit into the correct storage containers within a limited time window. The robots also had to navigate the course autonomously and return to a charging station without human intervention. The article describes the educational goals of the programme, emphasising hands-on learning across the entire development lifecycle: concept generation, mechanical design, electronics integration, control and perception software, testing, and competition under timed conditions. It highlights the role of coaching—students who completed the Innovation Project in prior years mentor current teams, offering guidance on project management and technical pitfalls while preserving student ownership of the work. The write-up situates the Innovation Project within ETH’s broader robotics ecosystem, noting related departmental activities and research groups that advance mobile robotics, biohybrid actuators, and applied AI. Practical details for observers are provided: the Innovation Project Final 2025 demonstration is scheduled for Tuesday, 16 December 2025 at 4 p.m. in the Main Hall of the ETH Zentrum Main Building, where the ten finalist teams will showcase their autonomous systems and compete for top honours. The article underscores the dual aims of the event—assessing technical performance in a competitive environment and communicating the educational value of experiential, project-based learning to students, families and prospective participants. Throughout, the piece blends factual description of the task constraints and event logistics with reflections on the pedagogical benefits of large-scale, team-based engineering projects that mirror real-world product development cycles.