Guillermo Balboa
Research Assistant Professor
Balboa's research Interests include site-specific crop management, crop simulation models and crop ecophysiology. He is passionate about agriculture, applying agronomic knowledge, soil science, and crop production principles to investigate innovations in farming systems that increase productivity, water, and nutrient use efficiency to achieve sustainability. Integrating the state of the art, field experiments, modeling, and digital agriculture tool. Working in collaboration with other research groups, farmers, industries, and stakeholders to develop a cutting-edge research and extension program. Working effectively with multi-disciplinary and multicultural research teams, where diversity is a key factor for success.
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Email: gbalboa7@unl.edu
Elijah Smith
Junior, Majoring in Software Engineering, University of Nebraska–Lincoln
Elijah Smith is majoring in software engineering with a minor in entrepreneurship. Inspired by his family's passion for agriculture, he began exploring where technology and ag meet. His internship under the Puntel Research Team offered a great opportunity to get exposure to the AgTech space, as well as challenge his web-development skills. During the spring semester of 2023, he worked on optimizing and improving the On Farm Research Network Database. Specifically, he spent time speeding up the search functionality and implementing features that allow users to search the database and compare studies with the yield data inside the study.
Glen Slater
Research Analyst, Eastern NE Research & Extension Center
Slater is a research technician for Laila Puntel and is based at the Eastern NE Research & Extension Centernear Clay Center.
He earned his bachelor’s degree in agronomy from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in 1987 and a master’s degree in agronomy in 1989. In 1990 he began working as a research technician for Richard Ferguson, professor and Extension soil fertility specialists, at the center and continued to help with the family farm.
Slater grew up near Harvard and graduated high school from Clay Center. He is married to Anne and has three adult children and three grand children.
RESEARCH GROUP ALUMNI
Seth Norquest
Master’s Student
Norquest is pursuing a Master's degree in agronomy focusing on site-specific nitrogen management. His project evaluates crop model-based nitrogen management tools to increase productivity and nitrogen use efficiency. Seth is a research technologist with Nebraska Extension and the On-Farm Research Network. Seth received his B.S. in agronomy from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln in 2019.
Christian Uwineza
Master’s Student
Christian Uwineza is pursuing a master’s degree in agronomy focusing on soil and water sciences.
Born and raised in Gikondo, Kigali, Rwanda, Christian graduated from Nebraska in 2019 with a Bachelor of Science degree in integrated science and a minor in leadership and entrepreneurship, and mechanized systems management.
After graduation Christian returned to Rwanda and worked at the Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture (RICA) for two years as TA/RA and a farm operations technician. While at RICA he was exposed to the mechanized side of agriculture and gained experience in tractor operations and maintenance, and leadership. His position came with a lot of responsibilities for solving problems and decision making.
By completing a master’s degree at Nebraska, Christian is excited to grow professionally and personally, and learn more about soil nutrients and water management.
VISITING RESEARCH SCHOLARS ALUMNI 2022
Marina Betta
Visiting Research Scholar
Marina Betta is currently working as a Visiting Research Scholar at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Precision Agriculture Team. Betta is originally from Brazil, she was born in a producer’s family and grew up in the city of Xanxerê, Santa Catarina’s state. She recently received her bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Engineering from the Federal University of Santa Catarina and during her graduation she had the opportunity to work with geoprocessing and remote sensing, leading precision agriculture projects and also working with land use and land cover mapping focusing on agricultural crops.
Jazmin Gastaldi
Visiting Research Scholar
Jazmin Gastaldi is from Argentina and is an undergraduate student of Agronomic Engineering at the University of Buenos Aires. During her studies, she worked as an intern as an agriculture consultant and learned about management and scouting of different crops such as corn, wheat, soybean and sunflower. She plans to continue studying and has research interests in precision agriculture, soil fertility and cover crops. Currently, she had the opportunity to participate in DAWN Summer Intern program with “Nebraska On-Farm Research Network and Precision Ag Lab” at the University of Lincoln–Nebraska, assisting with data collection for existing on-farm research studies.
Ana Clara Gomes
Visiting Research Scholar
Ana Clara Gomes is a Visiting Research Scholar in Puntel’s Lab. She received her bachelor's degree in 2018 at the University of Sagrado Coracao in Brazil. In 2019, she was an intern at the PAT Lab where she was able to publish part of her research. Her goal is to pursue a graduate program to acquire more knowledge to help farmers in Brazil. She is interested in soil fertility and precision agriculture.
Aron Muller
Visiting Research Scholar
BSc student in Agronomy at University of Sao Paulo (USP), with a certificate in IT. Past experiences involved laboratory work with Citrus micropropagation and fieldwork with Citrus production. I worked as an intern at a company called Tereos, the world's second largest sugar producer, where the main activities involved Sugarcane production.
Agustin Pereyra
Visiting Research Scholar
Agustin is from Rio Cuarto, Argentina, where he got his bachelor’s degree in agronomy at National University of Rio Cuarto last year. Throughout his studies as an undergraduate student, he received a scholarship to study in Mexico (University of Chapingo) and do internship in the US (Virginia Tech University). He is working as Visiting Research Scholar, assisting in various research projects of the team. He likes work in team, research, soil fertility, water management and precision agriculture, so this is a great opportunity to learn from it since his intentions for the future are to keep studying.
INTERNS 2021
Twitter: @zachrystrom
Zach Rystrom
Doctor of Plant Health
Zach Rystrom is a Doctor of Plant Health (DPH) student at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and is working with the Precision Ag Lab to pursue interests in Ag technology. The DPH program develops professionals with a broad knowledge base in plant science, soil science, entomology, plant pathology, and weed science. Zach received his B.S. in Diversified Ag (2012) and M.S. in Entomology (2015) from UNL.