Short biography

Dr. Kefauver is currently a Ramon y Cajal Research Fellow and Professor of Plant Physiology at the University of Barcelona Faculty of Biology in Barcelona, Spain. His current research and teaching interests are plant ecophysiology, climate change, agriculture, and forestry, including imaging spectroscopy, multispectral and thermal remote sensing, and GIS applications for multi-scale scientific research on these topics. He is currently the lead researcher on multiple national and international projects covering image analysis and the use of advanced technologies for ecophysiology in agriculture and forestry applications. His work includes piloting UAVs for image data acquisition and mobile, cloud-based, and PC phenotyping and precision agriculture software development. Besides essential basic research in plant ecophysiology, Dr. Kefauver’s current lines of research aim to give new direction to precision agroforestry and scalable high throughput plant phenotyping for improving environmental sustainability and food security related to global climate change. Dr Kefauver’s innovative research pushes beyond the state-of-the-art as well as advancing the efficacy of low-cost alternatives and open-source software for providing tangible improvements in developing countries. Dr. Kefauver’s recent projects as PI and Research Team include international and national projects funded the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (UN FAO), CGIAR (Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research), CIMMYT (International Center for the Improvement of Wheat and Maize), the CTFC (Forest Sciences Centre of Catalonia), Agrotecnio, and the Government of Spain Ministry of Science and Innovation in two RETOS coordinated national projects in Durum Wheat Phenotyping and Mediterranean Forest Genetics that have been renewed successfully with his participation since 2014. Within the Integrative Crop Ecophysiology – EcoCrops Research Group, Dr. Kefauver is the research lead on technological advancements related to satellite, UAV and proximal image analysis for plant phenotyping and precision agriculture; a licensed UAV pilot and systems integration engineer; informatics specialist, programmer; web developer; and PC, cloud-based and mobile software development expert. As a Professor, Dr. Kefauver has taught in the NASA Student Airborne Research Program (2009-2011) and accredited university courses in Environmental Remote Sensing and Photogrammetry and GIS in the USA University of California, and Plant Physiology, Environmental Plant Physiology, Plant Breeding, and Precision Agriculture in English, Catalan and Spanish since moving to Spain and has contributed to training programs in the United States, Spain, Peru, Kenya, Turkey, Italy, Tunisia, Finland, Chile, and Colombia. He has directed or tutored or directed five undergraduate senior thesis projects in Spain, Australia, and Colombia, two Erasmus+ MS students, seven MS and three PhD students, and is currently tutoring two additional PhD students in Spain. He also serves as Associate Editor Plant Phenomics SPJ AAAS, Academic and Forestry Remote Sensing Editor for Remote Sensing, Associate Editor in Technical Advances at Frontiers in Plant Science, and member of the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society (GRSS) Inspire, Develop, Empower, and Advance (IDEA) Committee.

More information at https://webgrec.ub.edu/webpages/000011/cas/sckefauver.ub.edu.html and  https://sckefauver.com.

Current Research Projects:

  1. Main Proposer and Chair Candidate, EU COST Action PANGEOS (Pan-European Network of Green Deal Agriculture and Forestry Earth Observation Science), (2023-2027)
  2. Co-PI, DROMAMED, Agrotecnio, Collaboration with the Universidad de Santiago, (with PI Prof. Jose Luis Araus,  2022-2024)
  3. PI, Forestal de Catalunya SCCL (CSF); CTFC, Cuantificación directa de la producción de piña mediante sensores remotos, (with Co-PI Prof. Jordi Bort, 2022-2023).
  4. PI, DENSIPLANT project,  Agrotecnio, Collaboration with the University Lleida Gustavo Slafer and Roxana Savin. with co-PI Prof. Jose Luis Araus,(2021-2023.)
  5. Researcher (official research working team member), MINECO RETOS Coordinated project “WheatPhenoScale: Multiscale wheat phenotyping: from ideotype to regional adaptation. Yield and stability”; multiple sites in Spain (P.I. Jose Luis Araus 2020-2023). .
  6. Scientific Coordinator, International Center for Biosaline Agriculture (ICBA), Developing a user-friendly application for smallholder farmers for detection of plant diseases and nutritional disorders. (PI Prof. Jose Luis Araus, 2020-2022). 
  7. Researcher (official science research team member), MINECO “RESILPINE – Understanding the evolution of integrated phenotypes for the resilience of Mediterranean pines in a changing environment” (I Prof. Cat. Jordi Voltas, 2019-2022) with  of Agrotecnio and the University of Lleida

Book Chapters (2)

  1. Araus, J. L., Buchaillot, M. L., & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). High Throughput Field Phenotyping. In Wheat Improvement (pp. 495-512). Springer, Cham.
  2. Araus, JL, SC Kefauver, M Zaman-Allah, MS Olsen and JE. Cairns. Phenotyping: New Crop Breeding Frontier. (2018) Encylopedia of Sustainability Science and Technology. Volume Crop Science, Section Editors R. Savin & GA Slafer, Editor R. Meyer, Editorial Springer (IF N/A)

Scientific Magazine/Journal Columns

  1. Fru, M. I. N., George, N., Fonabe, E. V., Tabe, A. C., Ngum, K. M. M. A., McNairn, H., & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). The Birth of the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society in Cameroon: The Quest for a Chapter [Chapters]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 10(1), 350-352.
  2. Kefauver, S. C., & McNairn, H. (2021). The Women in Engineering International Leadership Conference [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 9(4), 271-282.
  3. V. Vanthof, H. McNairn and S. C. Kefauver, “Down to Earth Podcast with Stephanie Tumampos: Reflections on the First Season of the Series [Women in GRSS],” in IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. 171-173, Sept. 2021.
  4. J. Hall, K. Roth and S. Kefauver, “Women Who Inspire and Empower [Women in GRSS],” in IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, vol. 9, no. 1, pp. 283-286, March 2021, doi: 10.1109/MGRS.2020.3039317.
  5. Roth K, Kefauver S. Adapting to COVID-19 Challenges and Moving Forward with GRSS Diversity and Inclusion at IGARSS 2020 [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine. 2020 Sep 21;8(3):104-.
  6. Kefauver SC, Roth K, Burgin M. From WinGRSS to IDEA: Thinking More Broadly About Diversity and Inclusion [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine. 2020 Mar 6;8(1):158-9.
  7. Kefauver, S. C., Burgin, M. S., & Roth, K. L. (2019). Women in GRSS Activities at IEEE IGARSS 2019 in Yokohama, Japan [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 7(4), 57-59
  8. Kefauver, S. C., Burgin, M. S., Bruce, L. M., & Roth, K. (2019). Women Taking on Roles in Summer and Regional GRSS Activities [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 7(3), 123-128
  9. Kefauver, S. C., Burgin, M. S., & Bruce, L. M. (2019). Dr. Marta Yebra: Balancing a Thriving Career and a Rich Personal Life [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 7(2), 182-184
  10. Kefauver, S. C., Burgin, M. S., & Bruce, L. (2019). Recent GRSS WIE Activities [Women in GRSS]. IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine, 7(1), 100-102.

Dr. Kefauver’s research has been cited a total of 2783 times, H-index 24, i10 index 42 at Google Scholar, and he has indexed 84 documents published with 186 co-authors, an H-index of 22 with 1922 citations by 1553 documents in SCOPUS.

Geography of Citations

Distribution of Areas of Emphasis in Indexed Scientific Publications, WOS.

Recent Science Indexed Scientific Articles (last 20 publications only).

[1]          Buchaillot, M. L., Cairns, J., Hamadziripi, E., Wilson, K., Hughes, D., Chelal, J., … & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). Regional Monitoring of Fall Armyworm (FAW) Using Early Warning Systems. Remote Sensing, 14(19), 5003.

[2]          Berger, K., Machwitz, M., Kycko, M., Kefauver, S. C., Van Wittenberghe, S., Gerhards, M., … & Schlerf, M. (2022). Multi-sensor spectral synergies for crop stress detection and monitoring in the optical domain: A review. Remote sensing of environment, 280, 113198.

[3]          Kefauver, S. C., Buchaillot, M. L., Segarra, J., Fernandez Gallego, J. A., Araus, J. L., Llosa, X., … & Piqué, M. (2022). Quantification of Pinus pinea L. Pinecone Productivity Using Machine Learning of UAV and Field Images. Environmental Sciences Proceedings, 13(1), 24.

[4]          Segarra, J., Rezzouk, F. Z., Aparicio, N., González-Torralba, J., Aranjuelo, I., Gracia-Romero, A., … & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). Multiscale assessment of ground, aerial and satellite spectral data for monitoring wheat grain nitrogen content. Information Processing in Agriculture.

[5]          Hamdane, Y., Gracia-Romero, A., Buchaillot, M. L., Sanchez-Bragado, R., Fullana, A. M., Sorribas, F. J., … & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). Comparison of proximal remote sensing devices of vegetable crops to determine the role of grafting in plant resistance to Meloidogyne incognita. Agronomy, 12(5), 1098.

[6]          Buchaillot, M., Soba, D., Shu, T., Liu, J., Aranjuelo, I., Araus, J. L., … & Sanz-Saez, A. (2022). Estimating peanut and soybean photosynthetic traits using leaf spectral reflectance and advance regression models. Planta, 255(4), 1-19.

[7]          Abrougui, K., Boughattas, N. E. H., Belhaj, M., Buchaillot, M. L., Segarra, J., Dorbolo, S., … & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). Assessing Phytosanitary Application Efficiency of a Boom Sprayer Machine Using RGB Sensor in Grassy Fields. Sustainability, 14(6), 3666.

[8]          Segarra, J., Araus, J. L., & Kefauver, S. C. (2022). Farming and Earth Observation: Sentinel-2 data to estimate within-field wheat grain yield. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation, 107, 102697.

[9]          Vatter, T., Gracia‐Romero, A., Kefauver, S. C., Nieto‐Taladriz, M. T., Aparicio, N., & Araus, J. L. (2022). Preharvest phenotypic prediction of grain quality and yield of durum wheat using multispectral imaging. The Plant Journal, 109(6), 1507-1518.

[10]        Rezzouk, F. Z., Gracia-Romero, A., Kefauver, S. C., Nieto-Taladriz, M. T., Serret, M. D., & Araus, J. L. (2022). Dataset of above and below ground traits assessed in Durum wheat cultivars grown under Mediterranean environments differing in water and temperature conditions. Data in Brief, 40, 107754.

[11]        Araus, J. L., Kefauver, S. C., Vergara‐Díaz, O., Gracia‐Romero, A., Rezzouk, F. Z., Segarra, J., … & Bort, J. (2022). Crop phenotyping in a context of Global Change: What to measure and how to do it. Journal of Integrative Plant Biology, 64(2), 592-618.

[12]        Rezzouk, F. Z., Gracia-Romero, A., Kefauver, S. C., Nieto-Taladriz, M. T., Serret, M. D., & Araus, J. L. (2022). Durum wheat ideotypes in Mediterranean environments differing in water and temperature conditions. Agricultural Water Management, 259, 107257.

[13]        Segarra, J., Araus, J. L., & Kefauver, S. C. (2021, July). Machine Learning Matching of Sentinel-2 and GPS Combine Harvester Data to Estimate Within-Field Wheat Grain Yield. In 2021 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium IGARSS (pp. 6288-6291). IEEE.

[14]        Nehe, A. S., Foulkes, M. J., Ozturk, I., Rasheed, A., York, L., Kefauver, S. C., … & Morgounov, A. (2021). Root and canopy traits and adaptability genes explain drought tolerance responses in winter wheat. PloS one, 16(4), e0242472.

[15]        Ben-Jabeur, M., Gracia-Romero, A., López-Cristoffanini, C., Vicente, R., Kthiri, Z., Kefauver, S. C., … & Hamada, W. (2021). The promising MultispeQ device for tracing the effect of seed coating with biostimulants on growth promotion, photosynthetic state and water–nutrient stress tolerance in durum wheat. Euro-Mediterranean Journal for Environmental Integration, 6(1), 1-11.

[16]        de Lima, V. J., Gracia-Romero, A., Rezzouk, F. Z., Diez-Fraile, M. C., Araus-Gonzalez, I., Kamphorst, S. H., … & Araus, J. L. (2021). Comparative Performance of High-Yielding European Wheat Cultivars Under Contrasting Mediterranean Conditions. Frontiers in plant science, 1190.

[17]        Santini, F., Kefauver, S. C., Araus, J. L., Resco de Dios, V., Martín García, S., Grivet, D., & Voltas, J. (2021). Bridging the genotype–phenotype gap for a Mediterranean pine by semi‐automatic crown identification and multispectral imagery. New Phytologist, 229(1), 245-258.

[18]        A. Gracia-Romero, S. C. Kefauver, O. Vergara-Díaz, E. Hamadziripi, M. A. Zaman-Allah, C. Thierfelder, et al., “Leaf versus whole-canopy remote sensing methodologies for crop monitoring under conservation agriculture: a case of study with maize in Zimbabwe,” Scientific Reports, vol. 10, 2020.

[19]        J. A. Fernandez-Gallego, S. C. Kefauver, N. A. Gutierrez, M. T. Nieto-Taladriz, and J. L. Araus, “Implications of Very Deep Super-Resolution (VDSR) on RGB imagery for grain yield assessment in wheat,” in 2020 Virtual Symposium in Plant Omics Sciences, OMICAS 2020 – Conference Proceedings, 2020.

[20]        M. L. Buchaillot, J. Cairns, E. Hamadziripi, K. Wilson, D. Hughes, J. Chelal, et al., “Multi-Scale Remote Sensing for Fall Armyworm Monitoring and Early Warning Systems,” in International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), 2020, pp. 4886-4889.