Message from the Ontario Regional Director Pradeep Goel

Dear Colleagues,

I hope everyone had a wonderful summer. Many of us have already been vaccinated as a result of the effective efforts of the Provincial and Federal governments, and we are in a position to resume most of our regular activities this Fall. We are making progress in both research and our professional life as our community continues to show resilience in the face of the COVID-19 crisis.

Through this newsletter, I'd like to share some recent advancements in our community with you all. I wish you all good health and a fruitful Fall season in 2021.

Pradeep Goel

Submitted by: Dr. Jaskaran Dhiman, University of Guelph

The Water Resources Engineering group at the University of Guelph's School of Engineering is actively involved in numerous field-scale and watershed-scale hydrological modelling research initiatives. The initiatives, which are supported by the Ontario Ministry of the Environment, Conservation, and Parks (MECP), provide important contributions to the improvement of modelling phosphorus losses from the Canadian side of Lake Erie. Other initiatives supported by the Lower Thames Conservation Authority, the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA), Smart Computing for Innovation (SOSCIP), and Mitacs are also being pursued by the group.

After a lengthy wait, two of the group's students (Amanpreet and Manpreet) were able to travel from India to Canada. We'd like to extend a warm welcome to them in Guelph. We would also like to welcome Dr. Pranesh Paul, who has recently joined the group as a postdoctoral researcher and will be working on the Large-Scale Lake Erie basin project.

Submitted by: Hugh Fraser, OTB Farm Solutions

Hugh Fraser is writing his second book about 'swing beam barns' built to thresh and store wheat, the big crop in Ontario during settlement by pioneers of European descent. Hugh recently toured one such barn built ca 1827, one of the oldest still standing. Hugh is a director with Ontario Barn Preservation whose mandate is to find innovative ways to preserve more of these wonderful structures. For information contact Hugh at otbfarmsolutions.ca.'

Submitted by: Neil McLaughlin

Call for Papers – Special issue of Agronomy

Neil McLaughlin has recently accepted the role of guest editor for a special edition of Agronomy entitled 'Design of Agricultural Machinery and Associated Agroecosystem Development.’  We are currently short on submissions for this special issue.  Papers on a wide range of topics related in some way to agricultural machinery are invited.

Agronomy is an open access peer reviewed journal published by MDPI, a large publisher with head office in Switzerland.  Agronomy is a general agricultural research journal covering a wide range of topics in agricultural research including agricultural engineering. Agronomy is rapidly gaining reputation as a first class peer reviewed international agricultural journal.  The 2020 impact factor was 3.417, up 31% from 2019.

If you have a paper and are looking for a place to publish it, you are invited to submit it to Agronomy for this special issue at the website below.  It is a good opportunity to gain international exposure and to highlight the contribution of engineering to agricultural research and development.

https://www.mdpi.com/journal/agronomy/special_issues/agr_machinery

For more information please contact Neil McLaughlin (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).