2023 Winners

PhD Category

1st Place: Magni Hussain, Pennsylvania State University
Green Fruit Removal Dynamics for Development of Robotic Green Fruit Thinning End-Effector


2nd Place: Suraiya Akter, North Carolina State University
Broilers' Heat and Moisture Production Under Air Velocity Treatments in Summer Condition


3rd Place: Piyush Patil, North Carolina State University
Simulating Lagoon Sludge Drying in Solar-Assisted Greenhouse Drying System


MS Category

1st Place: Carly Graves North Carolina State University
Evaluating Acidified Miscanthus Biochar as a Broiler Litter Amendment for Ammonia Control


2nd Place: Heather WhiteKansas State University
Modeling the Potential Influence of Subsurface Tile Drainage Systems on Downstream Flooding in a Midwestern Agricultural Watershed


3rd Place: Rashmi SahuPennsylvania State University
Apple Flower Bud Detection for Robotic Bud Thinning Using Deep Learning Neural Networks


Past Winners

The Competition
The Boyd-Scott Graduate Research Award is to recognize excellence in the conduct and presentation of research to build the knowledge base needed by engineers who design equipment, facilities, and processes for the sustainable operation of a biological system.

Contestants are required to be a member of ASABE.

Entry Deadline: March 15

The Boyd-Scott Graduate Research Award consists of a written competition, and an oral competition held during the ASABE Annual International Meeting. Judges will select three M.S. finalists and three Ph.D. finalists from the written competition who will then be invited to present their research before judges at a scheduled technical session held during the ASABE Annual International Meeting. The six finalists' meeting registration will be waived.

Cash prizes of $500, $300, and $200 will be awarded to the top three finishers in each category after the meeting.

Entry Form must be submitted with properly formatted paper. Please see guidelines below for formatting requirements.


2. Organization of Paper - Students are advised to adhere to the following guidelines when preparing their research paper entries:

a. Organization of the research paper must conform to the guidelines published by ASABE for refereed journals. Access the Guide for Authors for information concerning journal manuscript submission and formatting.

b. The entire research paper entry, including all figures, list of references and appendices, must not exceed 20 pages.

c. Some graphics (figures and tables) do not print or download well so students are encouraged to produce their graphics in black-and-white format.

3. Submit entry form and research paper as a PDF file. It is the entrant's responsibility to verify that the converted file appears as intended. Send to the Awards Administrator

4. Scoring - Click here to see the judging criteria and allocation of points.

For the current competition, all entries must be submitted via e-mail to the Awards Administrator by March 15th.