Since 2013, Jens Karl Wegener (born 1976) has been Director and Professor at the Institute for Application Techniques in Plant Protection at the Julius Kühn-Institute (JKI), the Federal Research Centre for Cultivated Plants, located in Braunschweig, Germany. In 2017 he was appointed Honorary Professor at the Technical University of Braunschweig, supporting the teaching program of the Institute for Mobile Machinery and Commercial Vehicles (IMN). He also coordinates the interdisciplinary block module Innovative Plant Protection Technologies together with students and instructors from six universities: Christian-Albrechts-University in Kiel, University of Applied Sciences in Kiel, Humboldt University of Berlin, Technical University of Berlin, Technical University of Braunschweig, and the Georg-August-University of Göttingen.

Prof. Wegener studied Industrial Engineering at the Technical University of Clausthal (1998–2004) and obtained his doctoral degree at the University of Göttingen at the Institute for Agricultural Engineering (2004–2007). He then headed the scientific working group Biomass (2007–2009) before being appointed Substitute Professor at the Institute of Agricultural Engineering (2009–2013).

His main research focuses on the optimization and risk assessment of processes and procedures in agriculture. He has extensively studied the potential, limitations, and benefits of new technologies for different agricultural applications. Since 2013, he has increasingly concentrated on novel plant production systems, in particular on cultivation concepts based on autonomous robotic systems.