The University of Georgia’s Institute for Integrative Precision Agriculture has awarded eight seed grants to fund initial research for projects at the convergence of agriculture, engineering, computing and related areas of study. The grants, the first of their kind from IIPA, follow a strategic push by the university to improve its industry collaboration across fields of study and support foundational research to advance agriculture and economic development in the state of Georgia.

For the first time in its history, the University of Georgia surpassed a half-billion dollars in research and development spending in fiscal year 2022. With total expenditures of $545.6 million — representing a jump of more than 10% from the previous year — UGA did not simply exceed the half-billion mark, it rocketed past it.

The University of Georgia's Institute for Integrative Precision Agriculture (IIPA), a new interdisciplinary unit dedicated to the research and application of new technologies in agriculture, has made three new faculty hires. Leonardo Bastos, Lorena Lacerda and Guoyu Lu joined IIPA full time during fall 2022, each contributing to the strategic mission of the institute to harness the power of technology and big data to sustainably provide for our planet’s growing population.

Walking barefoot through soft grass is one of life’s greatest joys — the warmth of the ground, the tickling of the blades of grass on your feet, toes wriggling free from the confinement of shoes — it is just spectacular. In the summer. In the midst of winter, after cold and rainy weeks, it sounds miserable, but if you are looking forward to that summer experience, you may want to prepare your lawn now.

On a warm morning in mid-September, tractor-drawn peanut-digging equipment burrowed beneath the peanut vines on the first of Tift County peanut farmer Greg Davis’s fields. This is the day peanut producers — and University of Georgia Cooperative Extension agents and UGA peanut researchers — work all season for.

The Dirt Dawgs, the University of Georgia’s soil judging team, placed third in the recent 2022 regional soil judging contest against 11 other universities. They will move on to compete in the national soil judging competition held in Oklahoma in March.