Tractor Technology

Roger Hoy joined the University of Nebraska-Lincoln as both a professor and the Director of the Nebraska Tractor Test Laboratory (NTTL) in 2006. His research efforts have largely been focused on tractor performance and roll-over protection. Hoy also advises the UNL quarter scale tractor team and employs around 35 engineering and ag mechanization students at the NTTL, which he uses as a teaching and mentoring opportunity. He is active in the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE) were he is currently serving on the Society Board. He has previously led numerous standards committees, has served on the ASABE Standards Council twice and on the Foundation Board of Trustees. How currently serves with the OECD tractor test codes and schemes and led that body from 2009-2011. Within UNL, he chairs the Biological Systems Engineering facilities committee and serves with the Nebraska Board of Engineers and Curriculum committees.

Santosh Pitla is a professor in advanced machinery systems. He specializes in agricultural robotics, unmanned ground and aerial applications in agriculture, agricultural equipment logistics and embedded control applications in machine automation. Since joining the faculty in 2014, he has been working to advance robotic tractor technology. He is at the helm of a team that built the automated Flex-Ro robotic tractor. He also has led work to enhance tractor testing at Nebraska's unique tractor testing laboratory, the only such facility in the Western Hemisphere. (Updated November 2024.)

Joe Luck, a professor of biological systems engineering, is an award-winning researcher and educator who works to develop variable-rate application technologies, sensors and control systems for site-specific crop management. He also is an expert in GIS and data management systems for agriculture and the development and utilization of liquid application technologies. His research includes irrigation controls, herbicide and pesticide spray applications and Controller Area Network tools that allow technology in tractors and other agricultural implements to communicate with each other without a host computer. (Updated November 2024.)