Early Detection of Diseases Using Plant Reflections

When plant diseases and insect problems are visible to the naked eye, it may be difficult if not impossible to treat. Christian Nansen, an entomologist from Texas AgriLife Research, has developed a non-intrusive and easy way of diagnosing plant disease at an earlier stage using a hyper-spectral camera. The camera determines how much light is being reflected from the plant surface. When plants experience stress caused by pathogens, insects or the environment, they change their metabolism that leads to subtle changes on how they reflect light.

The technology developed by the researcher can be utilized in plant breeding to determine genetic differences in germplasm. The same principle is being applied in seed analyses, detecting protein content in wheat, oil content in peanuts and maturation in tomatoes. Researchers are now using the technology to detect zebra chip in potato, cotton root rot and spider mites in corn at the early stages of infection.

Read more at http://agnews.tamu.edu/showstory.php?id=326