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 Two multispectral agricultural data sets, valued
at $1.5 million, will be used in teaching and research,
including efforts towards estimating soil health and carbon flux
from agricultural land in the Midwest.
Aerial Agronomy provided ACES and the university multispectral
images collected via aircraft during recent growing seasons
across Illinois, Iowa, and Minnesota, for a total of 17.5
million acres. The images paint a picture of crop performance,
as well as soil health and carbon content, across the region
throughout the growing season.
“As a retired research engineer from the University of Illinois,
I find it particularly rewarding to work closely with and
support ag research programs at Illinois,” says Bob Coverdill,
president of Aerial Agronomy, Inc. “Our unique ability to
provide aerial services and engineering support, literally in
the backyard of the university, makes this a natural
partnership. We look forward to continuing our relationship with
faculty and students in the College of ACES.”
According to Coverdill, Aerial Agronomy, Inc. is a leading
provider of agricultural aerial imagery. It provides full
service to farmers and growers through subscription-based
imagery and software tools to guide decision-making from
preplant to harvest. Its software platform, AirScout, is a
robust, easy to use, strategic tool that helps farmers reduce
input costs, make better in-season decisions, and increase their
profitability. Aerial Agronomy, Inc. has headquarters in
Champaign County, and serves growers throughout the Midwest via
its own fleet of manned airplanes and sensor systems.
One of the beneficiaries of the donated images is Kaiyu Guan,
assistant professor in the Department of Natural Resources and
Environmental Sciences (NRES) at Illinois, Blue Waters professor
with the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, and
affiliate of the Center for Digital Agriculture.
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“The donated images from Aerial Agronomy, Inc. are
very valuable and will enable a wide range of research in
agricultural productivity and sustainability, as well as education
for our students,” he says.
Guan’s work leverages remote-sensing data, such as the multispectral
images from Aerial Agronomy, along with on-the-ground field work,
supercomputers, and advanced statistical techniques to address how
climate and human practices affect crop productivity and ecosystem
functioning.
“Some of my lab’s work in remote sensing can really benefit from the
richer data collected by Aerial Agronomy in real-world production
environments. I also plan to use these images in undergraduate and
graduate classes,” Guan says. “We greatly appreciate the generosity
from Bob’s team. We hope these data can strengthen the university’s
land-grant mission and ultimately bring benefits to Illinois
farmers.”
[Sources: Kaiyu Guan & Bob Coverdill
News writer: Lauren Quinn] |
