Derek Heeren and Bill Kranz recently published a high-level journal article, Past, present and future of irrigation on the U.S. Great Plains. It reviews irrigation development and research in the Great Plains and Nebraska plays a significant role in that it has the most irrigated acres. The article cites a large amount of research done by BSE faculty over the past decades. Read about the research here.
Yufeng Ge and Post-Doc Research Associate, Nuwan K. Wijewardane were mentioned in the news for their work predicting total petroleum hydrocarbons in field soils with Vis–NIR models developed on laboratory‐constructed samples. This study investigated whether Vis–NIR models calibrated from laboratory‐constructed PHC soil samples could be used to accurately estimate TPH concentration of field samples. Read about their research here.
Santosh Pitla, Yufeng Ge, and Post-Doc Research Associate, Abbas Atefi's article, Robotic Detection and Grasp of Maize and Sorghum: Stem Measurement with Contact, was recently published by MDPI. "The use of agricultural robots to automatically collect plant phenotypic data for trait measurements can overcome many of the drawbacks of manual phenotyping." Read more about their work here.
Suat Irmak was mentioned in Nebraska Today's Achievements | Honors, appointments. He was named a 2020 American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers Fellow. Fellows are ASABE members who have been active within the organization, as well as teaching or practicing engineering, for at least 20 years. Irmak is being honored for his global impact in advancing irrigation engineering and understanding crop engineering interactions.
Santosh Pitla was was mentioned in Nebraska Today's Achievements | Honors, appointments for receiving the 2020 John Deere Award from North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture.
Aaron Mittelstet and Derek Heeren were recently mentioned in the Transactions of the ASABE for their new special collections. Aaron for his work on Streambank Erosion, Sediment Dynamics and Restoration: Monitoring, Modeling and Case Studies (SER) and Derek for his work on Preferential Flow and Piping (PFP) in Riparian Buffers.
Aaron Yoder shares his insight on how to reduce the number of tractor-related fatalities due to rollover in the Kearny Hub. "Research from around the world shows that death and serious injury are virtually eliminated when rollover structures are installed and seat belts are worn."
Tami Brown-Brandl was highlighted in Strategic Discussions for Nebraska for her use of engineering to research ways technology can improve production agriculture, as it creates a vision for the future and keeps farming resilient. Read about her research here.
Joe Luck was highlighted in Strategic Discussions for Nebraska for his research to reduce spray drift. Joe develops ways to make application systems more efficient in reducing spray drift. Read about his work here. He was also mentioned in The COE Update for being chosen to receive ISPA's 2020 Pierre C. Robert Precision Agriculture Award - Young Scientist. View the award here.