Abstract
Effective control of the parasitic weed sunflower broomrape (Orobanche cumana Wallr.) can be achieved by herbicides application in early parasitism stages. However, the growing environmental concerns associated with herbicide treatments have motivated the adoption of precise chemical control approaches that detect and treat infested areas exclusively. The main challenge in developing such control practices for O. cumana lies in the fact that most of its life-cycle occurs in the soil sub-surface and by the time shoots emerge and become observable, the damage to the crop is irreversible. This paper approaches early O. cumana detection by hypothesizing that its parasitism already impacts the host plant morphology at the sub-soil surface developmental stage. To validate this hypothesis, O. cumana- infested sunflower and non-infested control plants were grown in pots and imaged weekly over 45-day period. Three-dimensional plant models were reconstructed using image-based multi-view stereo followed by derivation of their morphological parameters, down to the organ-level. Among the parameters estimated, height and first internode length were the earliest definitive indicators of infection. Furthermore, the detection timing of both parameters was early enough for herbicide post-emergence application. Considering the fact that 3-D morphological modeling is nondestructive, is based on commercially available RGB sensors and can be used under natural illumination; this approach holds potential contribution for site specific pre-emergence managements of parasitic weeds and as a phenotyping tool in O. cumana resistant sunflower breeding projects.
Highlights
Sunflower broomrape (Orobanche cumana Wallr.) is a chlorophyll-lacking holoparasitic weed, which is considered a major biotic factor limiting sunflower production in large areas of Europe andAsia [1]
Cumana Parasitism Dynamics: Minirhizotron Experiments stages ofDynamics: O. cumana observed by the minirhizotron system included attachments, 3.1
The study revealed the relationships between O. cumana parasitism and host plant
Summary
Sunflower broomrape (Orobanche cumana Wallr.) is a chlorophyll-lacking holoparasitic weed, which is considered a major biotic factor limiting sunflower production in large areas of Europe and. Ortiz-Bustos’ group imaged plants under controlled laboratory conditions and applied excitation of a specific wavelength during imaging (UV light at 360 nm) These conditions may not be translatable to natural light conditions, where reflectance patterns of infected plants and the corresponding detection abilities of hyperspectral imaging may be less robust. 3-D reconstruction techniques allow for autonomous segmentation of the plant point cloud into leaf and stem-related points and the extraction of morphological parameters, down to the single organ level [12,14,15] Such detailed analysis of plant morphology can be employed for various agronomic purposes [13,16,17,18], including weed detection [19]. The current work set out to assess the possible use of 3-D image-driven models for early detection of O. cumana parasitism by analyzing morphological variations in the host sunflower plant
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