Auburn Hosts Forum on Data Science and AI in Production Agriculture and Natural Resources

Feb 21, 2025

By Kristen Bowman

Forum to be held 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday, April 21

Auburn University faculty researchers from the Colleges of Agriculture, Sciences and Mathematics, and Engineering seek to advance innovations in agriculture and natural resources. Together, they are hosting a forum titled Harnessing Data Science and AI for Collaborative Advances in Production Agriculture on April 21 at the Hotel at Auburn University and Dixon Conference Center.

The full-day event will provide faculty and students an opportunity to learn about the latest applications of data science and artificial intelligence (AI) in agriculture, forestry and natural resource management. It is intended to foster interdisciplinary collaboration across campus, with industry representatives, and with attendees from other institutions.

“Collaboration of researchers in data science and agriculture fuels innovation, accelerates discovery, and shapes a smarter, more sustainable future,” said Nedret Billor, director of statistics and data science in the College of Sciences and Mathematics, and one of the forum organizers.

The forum will feature keynote speakers discussing how data science and AI support the university’s mission, their role in research and extension within production agriculture, and how industry leverages these technologies to improve efficiency. It will also highlight the work of Auburn faculty and graduate students during an oral and poster session.

Organizers aim to identify key challenges and opportunities in AI and data science applications for production agriculture and natural resource management and to develop a roadmap with actionable recommendations for Auburn faculty and administrators.

In addition to Billor, organizers include Brenda Ortiz, Sunjae Won, Tanzeel Rehman and Simerjeet Virk in the College of Agriculture; Gerry Dozier in the Samuel Ginn College of Engineering; and Elvan Ceyhan in the College of Sciences and Mathematics.

Ortiz encouraged university administrators driving innovation, students and staff eager to share their experiences with AI and data science, and faculty whose research, teaching, or extension work could benefit from integrating these disciplines into their programs to attend. “Bring your research questions and ideas to the forum,” Ortiz said. “There will be a lot of opportunities to collaborate with your peers.”

For more information, go to www.aub.ie/data-ai-forum.

KEY DATES:

March 1: Registration and abstract submission deadline
March 15: Abstract acceptance notification
April 15: Poster submission deadline
April 21: Forum at the Hotel at Auburn University and Dixon Conference Center

Source : auburn.edu

Video: Seeing the Whole Season: How Continuous Crop Modeling Is Changing Breeding

Plant breeding has long been shaped by snapshots. A walk through a plot. A single set of notes. A yield check at the end of the season. But crops do not grow in moments. They change every day.

In this conversation, Gary Nijak of AerialPLOT explains how continuous crop modeling is changing the way breeders see, measure, and select plants by capturing growth, stress, and recovery across the entire season, not just at isolated points in time.

Nijak breaks down why point-in-time observations can miss critical performance signals, how repeated, season-long data collection removes the human bottleneck in breeding, and what becomes possible when every plot is treated as a living data set. He also explores how continuous modeling allows breeding programs to move beyond vague descriptors and toward measurable, repeatable insights that connect directly to on-farm outcomes.

This conversation explores:

• What continuous crop modeling is and how it works

• Why traditional field observations fall short over a full growing season

• How scale and repeated measurement change breeding decisions

• What “digital twins” of plots mean for selection and performance

• Why data, not hardware, is driving the next shift in breeding innovation As data-driven breeding moves from research into real-world programs, this discussion offers a clear look at how seeing the whole season is reshaping value for breeders, seed companies, and farmers, and why this may be only the beginning.