Ajay Sharda, Patrick Wilburn-Carl and Mary Ice Keystone research scholar and associate professor in the Carl and Melinda Helwig Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering at Kansas State University, has received a grant from Deere & Co. to innovate planting systems to more accurately place seeds and maximize productivity and profitability.

Sharda will lead the 3-year, $285,000 project, "New innovations and controls for planting systems," in an effort to help further evolve planter technology and aid producers.

"With rising input costs, increasing size of farming operations, uncertainty of available planting days and global supply chain issues, producers are continuously looking for newer innovations in planter technology to accurately place inputs while planting at higher operating speeds," Sharda said. "This project will focus on the evaluations of newer planting systems, developing implementation practices and establishing newer technology innovations needed for accurate seed and nutrition handling and placement for even emergence."

Sharda said the project goals will be accomplished through continuous on-farm research on producer's fields. The spatial data collected from crop production fields with real-world operating scenarios will help drive the innovation process to produce more intelligent and functional systems for farmers.

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