Ken Giles Receives Prestigious ASABE Award
The American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) has presented its 2015 Cyrus Hall McCormick-Jerome Increase Case Gold Medal to Ken Giles, a professor in the UC Davis Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering. The annual award honors “exceptional and meritorious achievement in agriculture that has resulted in new concepts, products, processes or methods that advanced the development of agriculture.”
Giles will receive his award at the annual ASABE International meeting, held July 26-29, 2015 at Louisiana’s New Orleans Marriott Hotel.
Giles has long been considered a global leader in agricultural chemical application. His research focuses on spray applications — including pesticide spraying and industrial spray coatings — along with the reduction of “spray drift” and environmental contamination. His major accomplishments have been in the development of new technology for mobile spraying systems. He invented the pulse-width modulated, solenoid-actuated spray nozzles that revolutionized the chemical application process, making it possible to deliver the proper amount of spray on a site-specific basis, while maximizing efficacy and minimizing off-site impacts.
Since November 2012, he and UC Davis development engineer Ryan Billing have supervised field tests of a motorcycle-sized, remote-controlled helicopter at the UC Oakville Station‘s experimental vineyard in Napa Valley. Giles and his team are one of very few research entities to have received Federal Aviation Administration (FFA) clearance to operate an unmanned, remote-controlled aircraft for such purposes. For roughly two decades, this small copter — dubbed RMAX — has been used to apply agricultural sprays to rice fields in Japan. The goal is to develop a database that will document how well RMAX could perform in agricultural operations in California and throughout the United States.
Giles earned both his undergraduate degree (magna cum laude) and master’s degree in agricultural engineering at the University of Georgia, in 1979 and ’83. He followed this in 1987 with a PhD in agricultural engineering, with a minor in mechanical engineering, from Clemson University; he joined the UC Davis College of Engineering faculty that same year. His many honors include numerous ASABE Outstanding Paper Awards, along with the 1999 ASABE Engineering Concept of the Year Award, shared with Graeme Henderson, for their development of an agricultural spray nozzle system that provides quick and independent control of both flow rate and spray droplet size.
The American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, established in 1907, is the professional home of international engineers and other specialists who endeavor to find sustainable solutions for an ever-growing population. ASABE members are leaders in the production, transport, storage and use of renewable resources. They put science to work to meet humanity’s most fundamental needs: safe and abundant food; clean water; fiber, timber and renewable sources of fuel; and life-enhancing and life-saving products from bio-based materials.
ASABE established its Cyrus Hall McCormick-Jerome Increase Case Gold Medal in 1932. The award is named for McCormick, inventor of the self-rake reaper; and Case, developer of the “reliable” threshing machine.
