SoilCam: A Fully Automated Minirhizotron using Multispectral Imaging for Root Activity Monitoring

Rahman, Gazi M. E.; Sohag, Hanif Ali; Chowdhury, Rakibul Islam; Wahid, Khan A.; Dinh, Anh; Vail, Sally

doi:10.3390/s20030787

Cited by 22 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 35 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Figure 4 ) from being measured, which is significant because data on genetic variation in early-season rates of above-ground growth have proven very valuable in predicting end-of-season biomass production [ 50 ]. Accelerating the rate of image acquisition could be achieved by: (1) a robot or robots that move around the field visiting minirhizotrons and collecting data, (2) cameras that can acquire images automatically when installed permanently in each minirhizotron, or after being moved from minirhizotron to minirhizotron [ 11 , 39 , 44 ], (3) or by a large team of people using many cameras in parallel. All of these options will require further innovation and/or commercialization to make the necessary equipment available and affordable.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

et al. 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background Roots are vital to plant performance because they acquire resources from the soil and provide anchorage. However, it remains difficult to assess root system size and distribution because roots are inaccessible in the soil. Existing methods to phenotype entire root systems range from slow, often destructive, methods applied to relatively small numbers of plants in the field to rapid methods that can be applied to large numbers of plants in controlled environment conditions. Much has been learned recently by extensive sampling of the root crown portion of field-grown plants. But, information on large-scale genetic and environmental variation in the size and distribution of root systems in the field remains a key knowledge gap. Minirhizotrons are the only established, non-destructive technology that can address this need in a standard field trial. Prior experiments have used only modest numbers of minirhizotrons, which has limited testing to small numbers of genotypes or environmental conditions. This study addressed the need for methods to install and collect images from thousands of minirhizotrons and thereby help break the phenotyping bottleneck in the field. Results Over three growing seasons, methods were developed and refined to install and collect images from up to 3038 minirhizotrons per experiment. Modifications were made to four tractors and hydraulic soil corers mounted to them. High quality installation was achieved at an average rate of up to 84.4 minirhizotron tubes per tractor per day. A set of four commercially available minirhizotron camera systems were each transported by wheelbarrow to allow collection of images of mature maize root systems at an average rate of up to 65.3 tubes per day per camera. This resulted in over 300,000 images being collected in as little as 11 days for a single experiment. Conclusion The scale of minirhizotron installation was increased by two orders of magnitude by simultaneously using four tractor-mounted, hydraulic soil corers with modifications to ensure high quality, rapid operation. Image collection can be achieved at the corresponding scale using commercially available minirhizotron camera systems. Along with recent advances in image analysis, these advances will allow use of minirhizotrons at unprecedented scale to address key knowledge gaps regarding genetic and environmental effects on root system size and distribution in the field.

show abstract

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

et al. 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Figure 4) from being measured, which is significant because data on genetic variation in early-season rates of above-ground growth have proven very valuable in predicting end-of-season biomass production (Varela et al 2021). Accelerating the rate of image acquisition could be achieved by: (1) a robot or robots that move around the field visiting minirhizotrons and collecting data; (2) cameras that can acquire images automatically when installed permanently in each minirhizotron, or after being moved from minirhizotron to minirhizotron (Childs et al 2020; Rahman et al 2020; Thomsen and Jensen 2020); (3) or by a large team of people using many cameras in parallel. All of these options will require further innovation and/or commercialization to make the necessary equipment available and affordable.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

Rajurkar

McCoy

Ruhter

et al. 2021

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background: Roots are vital to plant performance because they acquire resources from the soil and provide anchorage. However, it remains difficult to assess root system size and distribution because roots are inaccessible in the soil. Existing methods to phenotype entire root systems range from slow, often destructive, methods applied to relatively small numbers of plants in the field to rapid methods that can be applied to large numbers of plants in controlled environment conditions. Much has been learned recently by extensive sampling of the root crown portion of field-grown plants. But, information on large-scale genetic and environmental variation in the size and distribution of root systems in the field remains a key knowledge gap. Minirhizotrons are the only established, non-destructive technology that can address this need in a standard field trial. Prior experiments have used only modest numbers of minirhizotrons, which has limited testing to small numbers of genotypes or environmental conditions. This study addressed the need for methods to install and collect images from thousands of minirhizotrons and thereby help break the phenotyping bottleneck in the field. Results: Over three growing seasons, methods were developed and refined to install and collect images from up to3038 minirhizotrons per experiment. Modifications were made to four tractors and hydraulic soil corers mounted to them. High quality installation was achieved at an average rate of up to 84.4 minirhizotron tubes per tractor per day. A set of four commercially available minirhizotron camera systems were each transported by wheelbarrow to allow collection of images of mature maize root systems at an average rate of up to 65.3 tubes per day per camera. This resulted in over 300,000 images being collected in as little as 11 days for a single experiment. Conclusion: The scale of minirhizotron installation was increased by two orders of magnitude by simultaneously using four tractor-mounted, hydraulic soil corers with modifications to ensure high quality, rapid operation. Image collection can be achieved at the corresponding scale using commercially available minirhizotron camera systems. Along with recent advances in image analysis, these advances will allow use of minirhizotrons at unprecedented scale to address key knowledge gaps regarding genetic and environmental effects on root system size and distribution in the field.

show abstract

“…It is a nondestructive, underground, repetitive process system, which is costly to perform. To overcome this, Rahman et al [ 77 ] designed the SoilCam: a mini rhizotron multispectral imaging system with fully automated functions to perform onsite recording, monitor the plant root growth process, and allow phenotyping research of plants, as shown in Figure 62 .…”

Section: Cmos Image Sensor Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… ( a ) Minirhizotron field experiment; ( b ) SoilCam; ( c ) Root and soil analyzer software; ( d ) Control box; ( e ) 360° image captured by SoilCam of a Canola plant root; ( f ) Multispectral images captured by SoilCam [ 77 ]. …”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

CMOS Image Sensors in Surveillance System Applications

Sukhavasi

Elleithy

Abuzneid

et al. 2021

Sensors

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Recent technology advances in CMOS image sensors (CIS) enable their utilization in the most demanding of surveillance fields, especially visual surveillance and intrusion detection in intelligent surveillance systems, aerial surveillance in war zones, Earth environmental surveillance by satellites in space monitoring, agricultural monitoring using wireless sensor networks and internet of things and driver assistance in automotive fields. This paper presents an overview of CMOS image sensor-based surveillance applications over the last decade by tabulating the design characteristics related to image quality such as resolution, frame rate, dynamic range, signal-to-noise ratio, and also processing technology. Different models of CMOS image sensors used in all applications have been surveyed and tabulated for every year and application.

show abstract

SoilCam: A Fully Automated Minirhizotron using Multispectral Imaging for Root Activity Monitoring

Cited by 22 publications

References 35 publications

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

Installation and imaging of thousands of minirhizotrons to phenotype root systems of field-grown plants

CMOS Image Sensors in Surveillance System Applications

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About