Hovakimyan interviewed for local Wired-In feature

3/28/2017

Wilkins Professor Naira Hovakimyan (New York Times photo).

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Wilkins Professor Naira Hovakimyan (New York Times photo).
Wilkins Professor Naira Hovakimyan (New York Times photo).
Wilkins Professor Naira Hovakimyan (New York Times photo).

The News-Gazette's Paul Wood spotlights a high-tech difference-maker each Sunday in a feature called Wired In. This week, MechSE's Naira Hovakimyan, the Grafton and Lillian B. Wilkins Professor of Mechanical Science and Engineering, was interviewed, primarily about her start-up, IntelinAir.
 
What's the current state of development in IntelinAir?
 
Right now we are focused on digital agriculture. We are creating the "MRI of farms" by flying drones at low altitudes and taking high-resolution imagery.
 
How can the information help farmers?
 
We hope that with this technology we will be able to develop an early warning system for anomaly detection to prevent major damage, and alert farmers on taking actions ahead of time. It is obvious that with today's farming techniques it will be impossible to feed the 9 billion people on the Earth in 2050. IntelinAir aims to contribute to this challenge in a novel way that can have a long-lasting impact.
 

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This story was published March 28, 2017.