From creating fragile crop harvest-aiding mobile robots (FRAIL-bots) for strawberry harvesting to developing an automated robotic orchard platform designed to optimize fruit pickers’ performance, Stavros Vougioukas is addressing agricultural challenges and making an impact on California agriculture.
In fresh market fruit production, harvesting is one of the most labor-intensive operations, incurring high cost and dependence on a large seasonal semi-skilled workforce, which is becoming less available.
Big data is all around us –– even in the wine we drink. UC Davis’ Smart Farm Big Idea is tackling how to take some of this vast trove of information and synthesize it for the benefit of agriculture.
Mason Earles, assistant professor in the Department of Viticulture and Enology and the Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, is applying big data by merging agricultural and machine learning to glean information that improves vineyards’ health and yields.
As the climate changes, farmers need new, high-tech tools to precisely measure resource use and predict yield so they can produce crops with less water, fertilizer and pesticide. New BAE assistant professor Mason Earles is bringing expertise in artificial intelligence (AI) to this new era of agriculture by developing algorithms to help farmers better and more efficiently grow, treat and harvest their crops.
(Originally published in Ag Alert and courtesy of the California Farm Bureau Federation)
A researcher from the University of California, Davis, is seeking to commercialize equipment that could be used as an early warning device to detect a deadly disease in citrus long before trees show signs of infection.
The Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering programs are structured along three primary lines of excellence in biotechnical engineering, agricultural and natural resources engineering, and food engineering.
Funds Support Drought-Resistant Rice and Energy-Efficient Food-Drying Research
The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research has awarded more than $1.7 million to University of California, Davis, researchers to identify genes responsible for drought tolerance in rice and test a new energy-efficient food-drying process.
Students create new tools that could make irrigating crops more efficient
More than a half century ago, UC Davis researchers invented a mechanical harvester and specially bred tomato that revolutionized the processing tomato industry. Today, a new generation of scientists is developing innovative technologies to help farmers grow crops like this more efficiently.
Researchers accelerate crop breeding to keep pace with changing climate
Variable weather is creating extreme challenges for crop breeding in California. How do you develop crops that will thrive under certain conditions when you can no longer predict what those conditions will be?
Technology developed at UC Davis is giving growers tools to help irrigate more effectively.
UC Davis biology and agricultural engineering professor Shrini Upadhyaya and his team designed a sensor that attaches to a single leaf to measure temperature, light, wind, and humidity to help optimize plant irrigation. (Diane Nelson | UC Davis)
The key to effective irrigation is giving crops the right amount of water in the right place at the right time. Easier said than done, but new technology developed at UC Davis is giving growers a convenient way to find that sweet spot.
The bigger the challenge, the more excited Amanjot Kaur gets about figuring it out.
“It kills me when I don’t understand something — it just makes me more determined,” said Kaur.
Kaur is no stranger to challenge. Born and raised in India, Kaur moved with her family to Livingston, California, when she was in the eighth grade. She found the transition jarring, especially at school, where she struggled to learn English and was the only Indian student.
