This year the FruitCREWS Workshop titled: “Water relations and irrigation of fruit crops: from science to policy and practice” will be held in Naoussa (close to Thessaloniki, Greece) on June 17th and 18th 2025. Due date for the abstract submission is February 28th. If you wish to contribute and take part to this event please submit your abstract through the following form: click here.
Meet the first set of keynote speakers and their topics:
- Alan Lakso, Cornell University
Topic: Continuous water potential monitoring is now feasible – what does all that data mean and how best to use it to guide irrigation?
Dr. Alan Lakso was educated at the University of California, Davis. He received his BS in Biological Sciences in 1970, his PhD in Plant Physiology on temperature effects on malic acid metabolism in grapes in 1973. He is one of the top 5 fruit crop physiologists of the past 50 years working primarily on apples and grapes. He is known and respected by all current fruit crop physiologists in the world. He has made numerous contributions to the science of horticulture. Three of his significant projects include his pioneering work on leaf and whole tree/vine photosynthesis, on water stress of apple, and on the modeling of apple tree and fruit growth. Dr. Lakso has served as the Vice-Chair of ISHS Working Group Computer Modeling in Fruit Research and Orchard Management and has led several working groups, including Plant Biology of the American Society for Horticultural Science.
- Diego Intrigliolo, Spanish National Research Council, (CSIC)
Topic: Water savings and water use efficiency. What it is required beyond precision irrigation?
Diego S. Intrigliolo is leading the Water & Crops research team at the Desertification Research Center (CIDE) (CSIC-UV-GVA) which main scientific objective is to improve agriculture water productivity determining agronomic practices for optimize crop water use quantifying the different variables of the agroecosystem water balance. He is currently the Director for the CIDE research center, leading a multidisciplinary research team with over 20 scientists working on environmental and agricultural aspects related to soil and water conservation. He is involved in the Euro-Mediterranean PRIMA program as a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee. He has been serving for more than 10 years as Associate Editor for Irrigation Science and the Australian Journal of Grape and Wine Research and he was member of the Spanish Research Funding Agency (AEI) evaluation board within the agriculture and forestry section.
- Alon Ben Gal, Volcani Institute, Israel
Topic: Irrigation with non-conventional water sources
Dr. Alon Ben-Gal is a senior researcher in the Department of Environmental Physics and Irrigation, Institute of Soil, Water and Environmental Sciences, The Agricultural Research Organization – Volcani Institute, Gilat Research Center. Dr. Ben-Gal’s interest focus is self-described as: “X-treme agriculture: managing water in the arid zones”. His research and expertise include: irrigation of crops; agricultural utilization of non-conventional water sources including saline water, recycled wastewater, and desalinated water; optimization of water under irrigation in arid regions; plant response to environmental stress conditions; variable rate irrigation, and flow and transport of water and solutes in the vadose zone. Alon is the author of over 170 peer reviewed journal articles and book chapters. He enjoys active multi-disciplinary regional and multi-national collaboration on topics including agronomic, environmental and economic consideration of irrigation with low quality water and promotion of agricultural water productivity.
- Pablo Zarco, Spanish National Research Council, (CSIC)
Topic: New developments in hyperspectral imaging to track photosynthetic effects of water stress
Pablo J. Zarco-Tejada leads QuantaLab Remote Sensing Laboratory at the Institute for Sustainable Agriculture (IAS), Spanish Council for Scientific Research (CSIC), and holds an Honorary Professor position at the University of Melbourne, Australia. He focuses on remote sensing technologies for biotic and abiotic stress detection using hyperspectral and thermal imagery acquired by piloted aircraft and drones. With an Agricultural Engineering Degree (UCO, Spain), MSc in Remote Sensing (UK), and PhD in Earth and Space Science (Canada), he was Faculty member at the University of California, Davis, USA, Director of the Institute for Sustainable Agriculture (IAS-CSIC), Senior Scientist at the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission, and Professor in Remote Sensing and Precision Agriculture in the School of Agriculture and Engineering, Melbourne University. Highly-cited researcher since 2019, he is author of over two hundred scientific papers published in international journals. He is Associate Editor of Remote Sensing of Environment (RSE) and the European Journal of Agronomy (EJA) and has been recipient of awards during his scientific career in Spain, United Kingdom and Canada.
