Projects & Grants

When Blue is Green: Sustainable Blue Food Systems Driven by Integrated Aquaponics. USDA/NIFA/Sustainable Agriculture Systems grant,
The overarching goal of this Purdue University-led SAS project is to increase local and regional production of adequate, nutritious, and affordable blue foods (seafood) with a minimal environmental footprint to ultimately diversify U.S. agricultural systems and dietary patterns. Our transdisciplinary and cross-institutional team will implement an integrated approach to implement interconnected research, extension and education tasks including needs assessment, on-site experiments, multi-dimensional modeling, development of iterative communication platforms, market development, development of educational resources and experimental learning.

4-H Military Technical Assistance and Professional Development Evaluation, USDA
The goal of this project is to evaluate the 4-H Military Technical Assistance and Professional Development project. This project involves all land-grant universities in engaging military organizations, families, and communities in positive youth development programming by increasing awareness, attitudes and behaviors of the U.S. military community.

Department of Defense Youth Mental Health First Aid, USDA
The goal of this project is to pilot and scale providing youth mental health first aid training to Department of Defense civilians at locations across the world.

Shah Lab Seed Grant Awards 2022
Ginger Storage Options. Partner organization CRC Nepal.
This proposal attempts to understand the barriers to ginger storage by small holder woman farmers and co-identify viable on-farm/community ginger storage technologies that are culturally and socially acceptable and economically and viable.

USDA/NIFA: Sustainable Agricultural Systems/ #DiverseCornBelt: Resilient Intensification through Diversity in Midwestern Agriculture:
The core goal of this Purdue University-led SAS project, #DiverseCornBelt: Resilient Intensification through Diversity in Midwestern Agriculture, is to diversify the farms, landscapes, and markets of the Corn Belt. Our hypothesis is that diversifying crop production and markets will generate a suite of economic, social, and ecosystem services that benefit more people than provided by the current system of predominantly corn-soybean rotations and confined livestock. Diversifying both farming and farmers in the U.S. requires systematic analysis and assessment of pathways towards resilient intensification at farm, landscape, and market levels. Our team will implement a transdisciplinary integrated approach to coproduce new scientifically and ethically sound visions through objectives that cuts across research, Extension, and education.

USDA/NIFA: AFRI Education and Workforce Development Program, Professional Development for Agricultural Literacy: Growing the Workforce for Digital Agriculture:
The overall goal of this three-year project is to provide resources for educators in secondary schools that enrich their knowledge of digital agriculture and its application, including examples of curricular resources they can integrate into their classrooms and labs. A series of learning modules packaged into a course will become part of the continuing education offerings promoted by the Indiana Department of Agriculture. The course will be built on the foundations of the Purdue Agronomy e-Learning Academy’s Precision Agriculture course.

NSF Standard Grant: Rising Scholars: Web of Support used as an Indicator of Success in Engineering:
This project established a support and mentoring system for students with low socioeconomic status (SES) in the Purdue University School of Engineering. Scholarship support will be provided for twenty academically motivated, low SES students to support four years of education in engineering. Students with low SES typically come from high schools with fewer resources than their wealthier colleagues, impacting their ability to take Advanced Placement classes and to engage in academic support and tutoring for standardized exams, which can affect their placement in competitive engineering programs. This project will devise strategies and collect data to demonstrate that students that lack the competitive advantage of higher SES can successfully enter and complete an engineering major when the appropriate support mechanisms are provided.

Recently Finished

Innovative Green Clean-in-Place Technology with Micro-bubbles
Overview:
This project enhanced our knowledge of the fundamental features of micro-bubble (MB) cleaning for food processing equipment, with the goal of designing a portable MB cleaning device to help the food industry reduce the time and use of chemicals for cleaning of fouled equipment surfaces. This technology is expected to replace the CIP system currently used in the food industry to enhance food safety and quality, and environmental sustainability.
Co-PI’s: Huang, Campanella, Corvalan, Carroll, Mishra