Kaushik Luthra, EIT, PhD

Experience

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  IFFCO-Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Limited

  Jun 2014 - Jul 2014

  Summer Intern

  ■ Familiarized with the fertilizer plant and machinery for production and packaging. ■ Co-facilitated the quality check processes.

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  G. B. Pant University Of Agriculture & Technology

  Jul 2014 - Jun 2015

  Undergraduate Research Assistant/Student

  ■ Worked as a senior and developed soil erosivity model on daily rainfall analysis for Dehradun, India as part of the undergrad degree project.■ Presented technical posters in the Indian Society of Agricultural Engineers (ISAE) international conferences and national seminars held in India.

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  University of Arkansas

  Aug 2015 - Jul 2021

  ■ Lead the group in grain processing projects and successfully completed the experiments and published 13 peer-reviewed articles, 7 conference papers, and 1 fact sheet in 2016-2021.■ Developed innovative bench-scale fluidized bed grain dryer for working in all weather especially during humid conditions.■ Communicated research to industrialists, farmers, and researchers via 14 conference presentations. ■ Lab management and helped the team in the design of experiments, data collection, and statistical analysis using JMP, SAS, and Excel in projects related to poultry transportation and post-harvest grain drying & storage. ■ Organized and lead trips in extreme weather to get micro-environmental data during broiler transportation and communicated to 4 industrial collaborators ways to improve bird’s welfare and reduce loss due to bird’s death.■ Developed “E-chickens” as a tool to measure heat loss of broilers during transportation, which was used as an indication of thermal heat stress.

  • Senior Research Assistant

    Jan 2018 - Jul 2021

  • Technical Assistant-1

    Jul 2017 - Dec 2017

  • Research Assistant

    Aug 2015 - Jun 2017
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  DryMAX Solutions

  May 2020 - Aug 2020

  Engineer Intern

  ■ Lead the engineering group in the research and development of 300 bushels semi-continuous radiofrequency corn dryer. This included design and dryer construction, experiment design, empirical modeling, troubleshooting, quality testing. Also worked on developing radiofrequency dryer prototypes to dry woodchip, raisins, distiller’s grain, hemp, and alfalfa.■ Written 5 scientific reports to document the test procedures, setup, and results of the drying of various agricultural products. Also participated in a 3 million dollar Department of Energy grant proposal writing.■ Represented the company in various conference calls and in-person meetings to explain the novel drying technology to collaborating researchers, vendors, and investors. Show less

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  University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture

  Sept 2021 - now

  Post-Doctoral Fellow