Our Team
Andrew East
Andrew is professor of postharvest engineering providing industry-focused research primarily on storage and logistics of perishable horticultural products. His current research interest include non-destructive quality assessment methods, mathematical description and optimisation of processes, and cool chains.
Johan Potgieter
Johan is a professor of robotics within the MAF Digital Lab. His current research interests are mainly in the areas of additive manufacturing, sustainable product development and advanced mechatronics/robotics with applications in AgriTech.
Ian Yule
Ian remains professor of precision agriculture while being research director for PlantTech Research. Ian has considerable experience in precision agriculture, agri-technology and remote sensing; with a particular focus on hyperspectral imaging and image analysis.
Louise Hopkins
Louise ensures the smooth organisation of the administrative procedures and processes for MAF Digital Lab. She has considerable knowledge of business and management principles involved in strategic planning and coordination of people and resources, finance and project budget reporting.
Russell Wilson
CommercialisationRussell provides commercialisation and IP support to all of the work at MAF Digital Lab. Whether it be contracts, IP or funding access discussions, Russell knows what to do. Beyond this function Russell is not afraid to get his hands dirty and can invariably be found helping out with livestock or produce during Agritech field trials.
Rebecca Reed
Rebecca is a Research Management professional with more than a decade of experience. Rebecca has a MSc (Conservation Biology) with additional specialisation in Research Management. Project Management, Professional Writing and Research Portfolio Coordination. Her strengths include project coordination, R&D strategy, stakeholder engagement, technical writing and research funding.
Reddy Pullanagari
Research primarily focused on precision agriculture technologies with an aim of improving food supply and sustainability while minimising environmental footprint. Reddy works extensively with remote sensing and GIS tools combined with statistical algorithms to assess the health of plants and determine exactly how much water and nutrients need to thrive.
Chris Hamling
Chris is an experienced engineer who specialises in networked embedded systems and product development. He is passionate about the role STEM plays in the developing knowledge economy and provides leadership to many engineering project being undertaken. Previously Chris provided leadership of the VEX robotics competition to New Zealand.
Li Mo
Janelle has a strong interest in applied sciences relating to the use of non-destructive quality assessment techniques combined with advanced data analytics and modelling approaches. She works with several primary industries across fruit and vegetable industries.
Nitin Bhatia
Nitin’s research interest includes, pre-processing of remote sensing data including radiometric and atmospheric correction; image processing using deep learning (AI); land-use / land-cover change detection; uncertainty and sensitivity analysis; estimation/optimization of atmospheric condition parameters; and geo-spatial modelling.
Sebastian Rivera
Sebastian is an Agronomist Engineer with a Masters in plant science from Chile. Sebastian’s research interests include postharvest physiology, pathology and technology of fruit. His PhD research focuses on the development of a standard methodology for the evaluation of textural properties of fresh blueberries.
Gabe Redding
Gabes' research focus is in the area of applying mathematical modelling, artificial intelligence and synthetic data to gain insight into and optimise biological systems. He has worked on projects across a broad range of application areas including assisted reproduction, sports analytics, product packaging, and supply chain efficiency and optimisation.
Mica Reyes
Mica is an Agronomist Engineer from University of Chile, and provides critical technical support for a wide range of project within the group. She is equally comfortable collecting data in agricultural fields, orchards, in the postharvest or hyperspectral labs.
Heath Ascott-Evans
Heath has a BE in Mechatronics and is undergoing a Master of Engineering, with focus on the sensor technology for robot automation. His work on development of robotic automation solutions is driven by an interest in reduction of hazardous work and improvement in workers safety and efficiency.
Eduardo Sandoval
Eduardo has experience in earth remote sensing, geographical information systems (GIS), aerial imaging and photogrammetry (UAV’s), hyperspectral/multispectral imaging and global positioning systems (GPS). He currently supports a number of research projects that take him throughout New Zealand, commercially and academically.
Daniel Foster
Daniel has a BE in Mechatronics engineering and is currently undergoing a Master of Engineering, focusing on data collection and analysis. He is currently working on network and database design and interests include computer vision, and a lot of programming.
Praveen Veeregowda
Praveen holds a BHort from the University of Horticulture Sciences, Bagalkot, India. He later studied postharvest technology as his major during his Master’s at Amity University, India. Currently, Praveen’s research focuses on understanding kiwifruit postharvest physiology in tropical climates.
Stefan Carter
Stefan has a BSc in Physical Geography and is currently studying his MSc in Physical Geography. He is also employed as a Technical Officer. Stefan is interested and passionate about utilising remote sensing and GIS technology to monitor environmental change over time. Stefan can often be found in a small plane, ensuring the capture of critical data that feeds into a number of our projects.
Zhuo Yang
Zoe has a Bachelor of Agriculture from Beijing Forestry University, China and Master of Science (Horticulture Science) from Auburn University, US. Zoe is now investigating to use laser backscattering imaging technique to non-destructively predict fruit quality and maturity as well as to detect internal disorders for kiwifruit.
Zhan Widdison
Zhan graduated from Massey University with a Bachelor's in Mechatronic Engineering and is now his Master's in Engineering. He has worked on international projects with clients such as ZURU and has experience working with focused project teams. He specialises in the development and testing of electronic systems with links to mechanical applications.
Yujie Han
Han was born with a passion for plants which has kept her in the horticultural industry for several years. She is now working on postharvest physiology of kiwifruit, particularly on the impact of ethylene, controlled atmosphere and modified atmosphere packaging on storage and quality outcomes. Han has a Bachelor of Agriculture in Horticulture, and is completing a Masters in Horticulture.
Jean-Henri Odendaal
Jay specialises in the development of 4D printing technology with biomaterials and subsequently the associated materials science. He forms a part of the SfTi National Science 3D / 4D printing spearhead and has links with Scion, GNS Science and the Creative Design and Additive Manufacturing Lab at the University of Auckland.
Abdulquadri Alaka
Abdulquadri has a Masters in Food Technology, from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. He’s passionate about learning and building technological solutions to preserve horticultural produce. His Ph.D. research focuses on the development of a physical scale model to understand airflow and temperature distribution inside a reefer container loaded with pallets of produce.
Carlos Lopez-Lozano
Carlos BE in Chemical and Bioprocess Engineering and is now doing his PhD in Engineering. His research focus is to develop mathematical models to predict ethylene concentrations in kiwifruit boxes in order to assist with understanding box to box variability of kiwifruit storage quality in the supply chain.
Ruishu Cao
Ruishu has a bachelor’s degree in horticulture from China and completing a Masters in Horticulture science. Her project focuses on the description of fruit shrivel with non-destructive 3D description technology. Ruishu has previously worked on regulates auxin efflux regulation in tomato, in affecting flower abscission.
Talon Sneddon
Talon has a Bachelors in Agriscience, and is completing his Masters of Science (Horticulture). Talon is interested in plant cells, fruit physiology and data analysis. He will soon start his PhD which will continue his investigation of fruit skin damage within supply chains systems and the reasons for susceptibility to developing injury.
Raquel Lozano
Raquel graduated from Massey University with a Bachelor's in Food Technology and is now doing her PhD in Engineering. Her main focus for her PhD is to develop mathematical models to assess and optimise packaging materials for kiwifruit industry to meet sustainability commitments.