Okee Labs Tour: October 11, 2019
Dr. Julieta Ross and Randy Ross are co-founders of Okee Labs, a new Artificial intelligence (AI) startup in South Florida that is building capabilities to digitize agriculture for smallholder farmers and home growers. Using AI, Okee Labs is developing machines that do underlying mechanisms of thought and intelligent behavior and democratizing these capabilities in agriculture for sustainable food production. They were interested in touring our research lab and K.I.N.D. Garden to understand our research.
FAU Biology Class Tour: October 28, 2019
Nine students of Sheryl van der Heiden's class toured our lab to find out about biological control and our current research. Andrea Carmona Cortex introduced the invasive fern, Lygodium microphyllum, and the insects which have been approved to control it. Dr. Ashley Goode showed them the invasive aquatic weed, Eichhornia crassipies, and the insects that control it. Dr. Dale Halbritter talked about the July release of Pseudophilothrips ichini, A kind of thrip that controls Schinus terebinthfolia, or the Brazillian peppertree. They were then guided by Eileen Pokorny to the K.I.N.D. garden which showed them the diverse native Florida plant habitats versus the invasive ones caused by the aforementioned.
