Gripper devices

Abstract

Systems are provided for gripping or otherwise manipulating lettuce, sliced foodstuffs (e.g., sliced cheese, sliced tomato or other sliced vegetables), or other foodstuffs or other irregular objects or substances. These systems can facilitate the manipulation of groups of irregular objects, including distributing small amounts (e.g., individual instances) of such groups of objects. These systems operate to manipulate such objects by extending and retracting rods, wires, or otherwise-configured pins to contact and/or penetrate the object(s) to be manipulated. In some examples, the pins are retracted to individually dispense objects (e.g., slices of cheese) from a stack of objects. In some examples, the separation and angle of the pins can be controlled to, e.g., grip one or more irregular objects and subsequently to dispense some or all of the gripped object(s).