Heping Zhu |
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Heping Zhu
1680 Madison Ave., Wooster, Ohio 44691, USA
Phone: (330) 465-4101
Dr. Zhu is assigned to lead the resolution of a wide range of complex, persistent, intractable, and conflicting objectives that simultaneously enhance the science of pesticide applications for protecting crops while conforming to stringent environmental mandates. His research directly supports and impacts the goals of ARS National Program 305-Crop Production and interacts across fields that range from macroscopic delivery systems to microscopic biological reactions of pest-control agents on plants. He provides scientific and technical leadership to pioneer and conceive new hypotheses and concepts for next generations of sustainable digital intelligent spray technology innovations, formulate cooperations among national and international multidisciplinary team members, and transfer the developed technologies to commercial agricultural and industrial production.
Many of Dr. Zhu’s research outcomes have been adopted by end users to efficiently apply pest control agents, teach classes, assess chemical contamination, improve chemical formulations, control invasive plants, and design new sprayers and nozzles to achieve better crop protection and environment stewardship. He pioneered the big-data technology dated back to early 1990s and developed a user-friendly computer program DRIFTSIM that predicts spray drift potentials to overcome field experimentation constraints. He synthesized diverse engineering principles for the developments of a patented paint spray atomizer, premixing chemical direct in-line injection system, and biological pesticide delivery systems. He developed a portable spray deposition analyzer and DepositScan program to quickly determine the spray deposition quality for improving chemical application. He separated the critical components that would enhance efficiencies and efficacies of pesticide applications and developed unique high-speed image systems to measure and characterize single droplet impaction, retention, dispersion, evaporation and residual pattern formation on plant surfaces, which bridges engineering and biological researchers to elucidate the droplet biological reaction on targets and develop new chemical formulations and application strategies. He analyzed the interrelationships of the spray application process for pest control and established a comprehensive “half-rate” pesticide application strategy to reduce pesticide use for nursery production. Based on the “half-rate” outcomes, he led multidisciplinary teams to invent the world-first laser-guided precision spray technology and then a universal intelligent spray control system as a retrofit for conventional standard sprayers. This new intelligent spray technology has revolutionized the 80-year-old air-blast spray technology, and was commercialized by Smart Apply, Inc in 2019 (acquired by John Deere in July, 2023) to reduce pesticide use by more than 50%. The commercial product has been well accepted by horticultural crop growers in the USA and other countries to reduce pesticide waste and safeguard the environment. It also provides new opportunities for engineers, biologists, and growers to modernize integrated pest management programs with an economic and environment-responsible approach to enhancing crop production. His accomplishments were recognized by numerous prestigious honors including the USDA-ARS MWA “Early-Career Research Scientist of the Year” Award and “Senior Scientist of the Year” Award, National Federal Laboratory Consortium Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer, the Fellow of American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE), and the 2023 ASABE Cyrus Hall McCormick-Jerome Increase Case Gold Medal.
Dr. Zhu’s current research program focuses on discovering conceptual and developmental bases for coordinated macro and micro precision application methodologies and strategies to enhance efficiencies and efficacies of pest control agents and bio-regulating compounds while safeguarding the environment. His recent projects include:
- Development of improved intelligent precision technologies to efficiently apply pesticides, biological agents, and foliar products for efficacious and sustainable control of pest insects, arthropods, and diseases to protect horticultural, field and greenhouse crops.
- Enhancement of spray application efficiency and effectiveness through coordinating the micro influences of droplet size and velocity, travel speed, spray formulation physical properties, crop leaf surface morphology, and leaf surface orientation on dynamic impact, rebound, retention, spread, absorption and evaporation processes of droplets on plants and weeds.
- Characterization of atomization, spray deposition, and spray drift reduction potentials for new technologies applying traditional pesticides, biological pesticides and foliar agents through field, wind tunnel and laboratory assessments.
- Development of computer simulation programs to predict spray droplet displacements discharged from intelligent and conventional sprayers commonly used in specialty crop production.
- Investigation of new techniques and sensors such as electronic noses to accurately diagnose infested and infected plants at early stages in an effort to establish smart platforms for best pest management programs.
Dr. Heping Zhu Google Scholar
Professional Experience:
9/1983 - 7/1990 Graduate Research Associate, Jiangsu University, China.
12/1990-3/1997 Post-doc Agricultural Engineer and Research Associate, Agricultural Engineering Department, The Ohio State University/USDA ARS, Application Technology Research Unit, Wooster, OH (also admitted as a part-time graduate student between 9/1995 and 12/1996).
4/1997 - 9/1998 Project Engineer, Titan Tool Inc., Oakland, NJ.
10/1998-12/2000 Senior Project Engineer, Graco Inc., Minneapolis, MN.
1/2001- 4/2003 Agricultural Engineer, USDA, ARS, National Peanut Research Laboratory, Dawson, GA.
4/2003 – present Agricultural Engineer and Lead Scientist, USDA-ARS, Application Technology Research Unit, Wooster, OH.
Education:
1983 B. S., Mechanical Engineering in Farm Machinery, Jiangsu University
1986 M. S., Mechanical Engineering in Farm Machinery, Jiangsu University
1990 Ph.D., Mechanical Engineering in Farm Machinery, Jiangsu University
1996 Ph.D., Agricultural and Biological Engineering, The Ohio State University (Cumulative GPA: 4.0/4.0)