Date: February 25,2021

Dr. Mahdi Haghshenas-Jaryani (Principal Investigator) from the Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Dr. Laura Boucheron (Co-Principal Investigator) form Klipsch school of electrical and computer engineering, and Dr. Stephanie Walker (Co-Principal Investigator) from the Extension Plant Sciences department have received funding from the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) for research in Robotic Harvesting Systems for Green Chile Pepper. Through this grant, they will investigate the feasibility of using vision-enabled robotic manipulators and grippers to identify and harvest NM-type green chile peppers.

Award Amount: $199,948

Award Period: Start 2/1/2021 End 1/31/2023

Dr. Young Ho Park (Principal Investigator), Delia Valles-Rosales (Co-Principal Investigator), Dr. Hansuk Sohn (Co-Principal Investigator), Dr. Efren Delgado (Co-Principal Investigator), and Dr. Jon Juarez (Co-Principal Investigator) have received funding from the USDA for training of next generation workforce for disruptive technologies of IoT and Big Data in smart food science and agricultural domains.

Award Amount: $500,000

Award Period: Start 2/1/2021 End 1/31/2024