High-Throughput Crop Phenotyping Systems for Controlled Environments

Increasing crop production through genetic improvements and crop breeding programs is a key solution for the expected food crisis in 2050. Crops with improved traits of high yield potential and resilience to biotic and abiotic stresses due to adverse environments can be developed at a faster speed by integrating crop genotypic data with phenotypic data. While the efficiency of breeding programs is limited by unpredictable environmental conditions in field conditions, facility with controlled environments and emerging technologies can provide a better alternative for the fast development of new crop varieties. This chapter introduces the high-throughput phenotyping systems used in controlled environments and their potentials to be used for fast characterization of plant traits. Various styles of automated phenotyping platforms are summarized and their features are compared to provide a vision on how to select such systems. The chapter also provides an introduction of some typical sensors that are typically used by researchers and commercial sectors for plant phenotyping in controlled environments. At the end of the chapter, a case study is provided to demonstrate how low-cost and automated plant phenotyping systems can be developed to suit customized studies. Methods of hardware development, data analysis, and results are discussed to show case the application of such a low-cost system. A vision of next-generation autonomous crop phenotyping system is provided too.