Detection of the tulip breaking virus (TBV) in tulips using optical sensors

Abstract

The tulip breaking virus (TBV) causes severe economic losses for countries that export tulips such as the Netherlands. Infected plants have to be removed from the field as soon as possible. There is an urgent need for a rapid and objective method of screening. In this study, four proximal optical sensing techniques for the detection of TBV in tulip plants were evaluated and compared with a visual assessment by crop experts as well as with an ELISA (enzyme immunoassay) analysis of the same plants. The optical sensor techniques used were an RGB color camera, a spectrophotometer measuring from 350 to 2500 nm, a spectral imaging camera covering a spectral range from 400 to 900 nm and a chlorophyll fluorescence imaging system that measures the photosynthetic activity. Linear discriminant classification was used to compare the results of these optical techniques and the visual assessment with the ELISA score. The spectral imaging system was the best optical technique and its error was only slightly larger than the visual assessment error. The experimental results appear to be promising, and they have led to further research to develop an autonomous robot for the detection and removal of diseased tulip plants in the open field. The application of this robot system will reduce the amount of insecticides and the considerable pressure on labor for selecting diseased plants by the crop expert.

Mineral Oils Impact on Yield of Progeny Bulbs and Quality of Cut Tulip Flowers as Well as Spread of Viruses

“…An effective solution is a combination of biological protection with plants more resistant to disease, which is still, time-consuming and costly procedure. For several years, trials have been carried out using cameras and other optical devices that, based on the color of the leaf, chlorophyll fluorescence, and intensity of photosynthesis, allow for the construction of automated robots to detect and remove the virus-infected plants [Polder et al 2010].…”

Hyperspectral and Chlorophyll Fluorescence Imaging for Early Detection of Plant Diseases, with Special Reference to Fusarium spec. Infections on Wheat

“…This also may enhance success of discrimination of infected and healthy tissue areas. Applying this idea, [105] sought to improve results of disease recognition with spectral imaging on differentially colored leaves by combining form parameters (length, width, depth of the object), number of pixels and average signal intensities. In addition, by penalized likelihood warping, [48] successfully aligned incongruent CF images of Xanthomonas campestris pv.…”

The occurrence of the Tulip breaking virus in tulips in the northern part of Turkey

“…Tulips and other bulbous ornamental crops are often infected by several viruses (EPPO, 2002;Sochacki, 2013). Among them, the Tulip breaking virus (TBV) is one of the most widely occurring and economically important viruses of tulips (Polder et al, 2010). TBV is a member of the Potyvirus genus.…”