The Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar (IITGN) concluded a two-day international workshop, “Toward Sustainable Agriculture: Managing Droplet–Solid Interactions through Surface Science,” aimed at promoting innovations to improve pesticide efficiency, water use, and crop health. The event brought together researchers, industry experts, and agricultural practitioners from India and abroad.
Organised under the Ministry of Education’s SPARC initiative, the workshop fostered interdisciplinary collaboration and knowledge sharing. Leading participants included Prof Ranjan Ganguly (Jadavpur University), Prof Constantine Megaridis (University of Illinois Chicago), Prof Soumyadip Sett (IITGN), Prof Pallab Sinha Mahapatra (IIT Madras), Prof Jonathan Boreyko (Virginia Tech), and Prof Sunghwan (Sunny) Jung (Cornell University).
During the inaugural session, Prof Soumyadip Sett welcomed participants and highlighted the importance of interdisciplinary and international research in addressing agriculture-related sustainability challenges.
“Meeting food security demands for over 1.4 billion people while simultaneously minimising chemical inputs and maintaining environmental stewardship is challenging. Platforms such as this workshop could foster meaningful dialogue across disciplines, enabling innovations that address food security, climate variability, resource efficiency, and environmental sustainability,” said Prof Vimal Mishra, Dean of Research and Development at IITGN, while speaking on the workshop’s objectives.
The workshop featured technical sessions, plenary lectures, flash talks, and poster presentations. Presentations highlighted how liquids such as pesticide sprays, irrigation droplets, and rain interact with plant surfaces to influence crop health, resource efficiency, and environmental impact. Experts demonstrated how scientific principles can be applied to real-world agriculture.
Prof Saptarshi Basu (IISc Bengaluru) and Prof Amitava Datta (Jadavpur University) unpacked how sprays are formed and how droplets break, move, and settle in the air—processes that determine whether agricultural sprays reach crops efficiently or are lost to drift and evaporation. Their talks emphasized that controlling droplet size and behavior at the source is central to reducing chemical wastage and improving precision in farming.
Building on these fundamentals, Prof Cameron Tropea (Technische Universität Darmstadt), Dr Sujoy Saha (ICAR-NRCG), Prof Sunghwan Jung (Cornell University), Prof Jonathan Boreyko (Virginia Tech), and Prof Amit Agrawal (IIT Bombay) showcased innovative approaches to optimize agricultural sprays and liquid delivery systems. Prof Tropea and Dr Saha demonstrated engineering techniques to control droplet size, highlighting how this can reduce pesticide drift and improve efficiency. Prof Sunghwan illustrated droplet ejection and transport using the everyday example of onion cutting, showing how simple phenomena can reveal insights into complex fluid behavior. Prof Boreyko described how infected plants naturally “sneeze” to spread disease,” highlighting previously overlooked pathways that influence crop health. Prof Agrawal explained how fluid flow through textured microchannels can be harnessed to improve liquid transport systems, with applications for both agriculture and energy management.
Panel discussions focused on bridging laboratory innovations with field applications, noting that inefficient pesticide use drives pest resistance, environmental contamination, and food safety risks. The transition toward “Agriculture 4.0” was also discussed, emphasizing data-driven, autonomous decision-making tailored to India’s small landholdings and diverse cropping systems.
The workshop provided a platform for emerging talent, featuring 16 flash talks and 22 poster presentations, with awards presented to both faculty and students.
“Such sessions reinforce SPARC’s emphasis on capacity building by equipping the next generation of researchers with the skills to build professional networks, communicate science effectively, and cultivate curiosity at the interface of engineering and agricultural science,” said Prof Pallab Sinha Mahapatra (IIT Madras).
“Sustainable agriculture cannot be achieved in silos; it requires co-creation of solutions grounded in real field challenges. The objective of this workshop was to advance scientific understanding and build a shared language between engineers, plant scientists, and agricultural practitioners,” stated Prof Ranjan Ganguly (Jadavpur University).
Supported by ANRF and the Gujarat State Biotechnology Mission (GSBTM) under the Department of Science and Technology, Government of Gujarat, and sponsored by ATOS Instruments, Phantom AMETEK, and Springer, the workshop reflected India’s growing commitment to science-driven, sustainable agricultural development. As noted by Prof Ranjan Ganguly, the workshop was designed as an interactive platform for idea exchange. “Sustainable agriculture cannot be achieved in silos; it requires co-creation of solutions grounded in real field challenges. The objective of this workshop was to advance scientific understanding and build a shared language between engineers, plant scientists, and agricultural practitioners,” he said.
Through this workshop, the IITGN team, comprising Prof Sett, Prof Subramanian Sankaranarayanan, Prof SriharithaRowthu, and Prof Uddipta Ghosh, reaffirmed the Institute’s role as a hub for interdisciplinary research, global collaboration, and commitment to promoting the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations and the Government of India.