Wishes for a Bountiful 2020!

Weed-killing autonomous robots. Genetically improved crops. Models of how humans interact with the environment. Collection of agricultural data from the field in real-time.

The future of AgTech looks bright, especially at Illinois, where, in 2019, we:

• launched Centers for Digital Agriculture (co-led Prof. Vikram Adve) and Autonomy (co-led by Prof. Kris Hauser);
• established CS + Animal Sciences, a second ground-breaking bachelor’s degree offered in partnership with the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences, joining CS + Crop Sciences as a CS + X blended degree;
• saw a $500,000 scholarship donation to support students in CS + Crop Sciences;
• created new computational tools that helped sequence more than 1,100 plant species (Prof. Tandy Warnow);
• hosted the National Robotics Roadmap's Chicago workshop; 
• added eight new faculty, including robotics experts Nancy M. Amato and Kris Hauser;
• are now home to over a dozen AgTech companies in the University of Illinois Research Park.

CS alumnus Marc Andreessen (BS CS ’94) once wrote that “software is eating the world,” describing the process that’s now known as Digital Transformation.  But today, more than ever, software is helping to feed the world. 

From all of us at Illinois Computer Science, best wishes for a bountiful new year!