BAE - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor
- Professor
Ajay Sharda received a bachelor's degree in agricultural engineering from Punjab Agricultural University, India in 1998. From 1998 to 1999, he worked for Escorts Ltd. as a service and sales engineer. Sharda returned to Punjab Agricultural University in 1999, received a master's in farm power and machinery in 2001, and then joined the farm power and machinery department as a research assistant. In March 2003, he became an assistant professor in the department. In 2007, Sharda took a sabbatical to join the biosystems engineering doctorate program at Auburn University. He left his tenured position at Punjab Agricultural University in January 2012 and became a post-doctoral fellow at the Center for Precision and Automated Agricultural Systems at Washington State University. In 2013, he came to K-State as an assistant professor and was promoted to professor in 2023.
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor
- Associate Professor
- Principal Investigator
- Research
Dr. Daniel Flippo is an assistant professor of biological and agricultural engineering. He came to the K-State in 2011 as an assistant professor. He has more than a decade of industry experience from Cessna Aircraft, Tinker Air Force Base and John Deere. He holds bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees in mechanical engineering and his research is focused on robotics. Flippo is also a board member of BotsKC, which is a STEM learning group that promotes engineering and manufacturing through battling robotic competition.
Flippo has served as principal investigator or co-PI on several research projects. He has directly supervised four doctorate and master's students, and numerous undergraduate research students. He has presented to several conferences and groups on agricultural engineering, robotics, and terra-mechanics. He currently teaches four courses in off road vehicle design, drive train, mechatronics, hydraulics and research experimentation.
Donghai Wang received a bachelor's degree in agricultural engineering from Northeast Agricultural University, China, in 1982, a master's in biological and agricultural engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1994, and a doctorate in biological and agricultural engineering from Texas A&M University in 1997. He completed postdoctoral training at the USDA-ARS Center for Grains and Animal Health Research from 1998 to 1999. In 2001, Wang joined the Department of Biological and Agricultural Engineering at K-State as an assistant professor. He was promoted to associate professor in 2007 and professor in 2011. Prior to coming to K-State, he worked as an instructor and lecturer at Northeast Agricultural University and a project engineer at Advanced Technologies, Inc.
Job Titles:
- President
- Member of Committee
Dr. Cengiz Altan, President's Associates Presidential Professor
Job Titles:
- Assistant Professor
- Member of Committee
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor
- Member of Committee
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor Emeritus
Job Titles:
- Senior Associate Dean and Professor
Jonathan Aguilar earned both his bachelor's and master's degrees in agricultural engineering, with focus on land and water resources from the University of the Philippines-Los Baños (UPLB). He gained his professional AE licensure in the Philippines after passing the board exam with national honors. He worked at UPLB as University Researcher II and handled several water resource related projects with UPLB Foundation Inc., Department of Agriculture and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. He then came to K-State where he received his doctorate in in 2009. His dissertation focused on the changes of ecologically relevant flow parameters in Kansas' streams. Aguilar then worked as a USDA ARS postdoc agricultural engineer in Sidney, MT from 2009 to 2011 and as postdoc Agricultural Scientist in Mandan, ND from 2011 to 2012. His research activities include remote sensing of crop residue and spatiotemporal analysis of crop diversity indices for the contiguous U.S. In December 2012, he became an extension water resource engineer with K-State Research and Extension based in the Southwest area office in Garden City, KS.
Job Titles:
- Professor and Department Head Emeritus
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor
- Assistant Professor at K - State
- Research
Dr. Lisa Wilken received a bachelor's degree in biological and agricultural engineering from K-State in 2003, and a doctorate in the same subject from Texas A&M University in 2009. She has been an assistant professor at K-State since 2012, where she has led the department in incorporating advanced biological sciences into the biological systems engineering (BSE) program and in developing the biological option in the BSE program. She has also developed and taught courses in biological engineering fundamentals, advances in biological engineering, and bioseparations engineering; taught and developed new course content for Biological & Agricultural Engineering Design and Biological Systems Engineering Design Project I; and taught Properties of Biological Materials.
Since joining the faculty at K-State, Wilken has been honored with 16 awards on the college, university, and national levels including the 2016 ASABE A.W. Farrall Young Educator Award, 2016 Kansas State University Presidential Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, 2016 University Distinguished Faculty Award for Mentoring of Undergraduate Students in Research, 2016 College of Engineering Charles H. Scholer Faculty Award, 2015 College of Engineering Outstanding Assistant Professor Award, College of Engineering Dean's Awards of Excellence in Teaching (2016) and in Service (2015), 2017 ASABE Gale A. Holloway Professional Development Award, 2017 ASEE Early Achievement in Education Award, 2017 James L. Hollis Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, 2018 Kansas State University Presidential Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Advising, and two Presidential Citations from The Institute of Biological Engineering for exemplary service.
Job Titles:
- Department Head and Professor
- Professor and Department Head
Mark Wilkins comes to Kansas State University after six years as a professor of biological systems engineering, as well as food science and technology, and as the director of the Industrial Agricultural Products Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. While at UNL, Wilkins was awarded the Nebraska Corn Checkoff Presidential Chair to support his research developing valuable products from corn. Wilkins also served as the graduate chair for biological systems engineering at UNL and was a member of the UNL faculty senate. From 2005-2016, Wilkins was on the faculty of the biosystems engineering department at Oklahoma State University. Wilkins researched processes to convert cellulosic biomass to fuels and chemicals; taught courses in bioprocess engineering, renewable energy and food engineering; and organized several short-term study abroad courses. He also served on OSU's graduate council and was the graduate chair for biosystems engineering. From 2004-05, Wilkins was a postdoctoral engineer at the USDA-Agricultural Research Service's Citrus and Subtropical Products Laboratory in Winter Haven, Florida. While there, Wilkins was a co-inventor on two U.S. patents related to ethanol production from citrus peel waste. Wilkins received his bachelor's degree in agricultural and biological engineering from Purdue University in 1999, his master's in agricultural engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2001, and his doctorate in agricultural engineering from UIUC in 2004. Wilkins is a licensed Professional Engineer in the state of Oklahoma.
Zhang worked as a repair technician at the Huailai County Tractor Repair Factory in Hebei, China, from 1970 to 1974, and then as a manufacturing engineer at the Baoding Internal Combustion Engine Factory, also in Hebei, from 1974 to 1977. He was a research engineer at the Tianjin Research Institute of Agricultural Machinery in Tianjin, China, from 1977 to 1981. Zhang worked as a graduate research assistant at Purdue University from 1981 to 1983, at Virginia Tech from 1984 to 1987, and as a postdoctoral research associate at University of California, Davis in 1987. He was a guest professor at Institut für Landtechnik, Universität Bonn, West Germany, from 1987 to 1988 and was a visiting assistant professor in the department of agricultural engineering at Virginia Tech from 1988 to 1990. Zhang came to K-State in 1990 as an assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 1995 and professor in 2001. He has served as the graduate program director for the department since 1996.
Zhang has been teaching three undergraduate and graduate-level courses in sensors, controls, and instrumentation. In teaching these courses, he emphasizes hands-on training and has guided more than 300 team design projects. Since 2007, he has advised the K-State Student Robotics Design team and won all the championships at the International Student Robotics Design Competition sponsored by ASABE in nine consecutive years (2007-2015). Zhang has advised 15 master's students, 15 doctoral students, and numerous post-doctoral researchers and visiting scholars. Zhang's contributions have been recognized through several awards, including the 2007 Robert R. and Lila L. Snell Distinguished Career Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, the 2012 Myers-Alford Memorial Teaching Award by the K-State College of Engineering, and two ASABE paper awards.
Zhang has been very active in international activities. Over the years, he has taught at many universities in China, Germany, Japan, Thailand, Philippines, and Mexico, and was invited to give speeches and seminars at many international conferences. He has been appointed as a guest professor by more than ten universities around the world. He is the founding President of the Association of Overseas Chinese Agricultural, Biological, and Food Engineers (AOCABFE). In 2010, he was selected a U.
Job Titles:
- Keystone Research Scholar
- Terry Beemer Foundation Chair for Engineering Innovation
Job Titles:
- Associate Professor Emeritus
Job Titles:
- Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Programs Emeritus
Job Titles:
- Academic Program Specialist
Job Titles:
- Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Programs and Professor
Job Titles:
- University Distinguished Professor and Ancillary Faculty