Abstract
The partitioning of light is very difficult to assess, especially in discontinuous or irregular canopies. The aim of the present study was to analyze the spatial distribution of photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) in a heterogeneous cotton canopy based on a geo-statistical sampling method. Field experiments were conducted in 2011 and 2012 in Anyang, Henan, China. Field plots were arranged in a randomized block design with the main plot factor representing the plant density. There were 3 replications and 6 densities used in every replicate. The six plant density treatments were 15,000, 33,000, 51,000, 69,000, 87,000 and 105,000 plants ha−1. The following results were observed: 1) transmission within the canopy decreased with increasing density and significantly decreased from the top to the bottom of the canopy, but the greatest decreases were observed in the middle layers of the canopy on the vertical axis and closing to the rows along the horizontal axis; 2) the transmitted PAR (TPAR) of 6 different cotton populations decreased slowly and then increased slightly as the leaves matured, the TPAR values were approximately 52.6–84.9% (2011) and 42.7–78.8% (2012) during the early cotton developmental stage, and were 33.9–60.0% (2011) and 34.5–61.8% (2012) during the flowering stage; 3) the Leaf area index (LAI) was highly significant exponentially correlated (R2 = 0.90 in 2011, R2 = 0.91 in 2012) with the intercepted PAR (IPAR) within the canopy; 4) and a highly significant linear correlation (R2 = 0.92 in 2011, R2 = 0.96 in 2012) was observed between the accumulated IPAR and the biomass. Our findings will aid researchers to improve radiation-use efficiency by optimizing the ideotype for cotton canopy architecture based on light spatial distribution characteristics.
Highlights
Crop yields depend on a canopy’s capacity to intercept and efficiently use solar radiation
Active radiation (PAR) represents the solar radiation that can be absorbed by green plants [1] and used for photosynthesis to produce biomass [2,3,4,5]
Numerous investigations of radiation interception have been conducted using various approaches [8,9,10,11] and models such as CERES [12,13], GROPGRO [14], AFRCWHEAT [15] and CropSyst [16] based on their description of light extinction in plant canopies
Summary
Crop yields depend on a canopy’s capacity to intercept and efficiently use solar radiation. In 1953, Beer’s law [7] was used to measure the leaf area and light intensity within each layer based on height in order to describe the spatial distribution of light. Numerous investigations of radiation interception have been conducted using various approaches [8,9,10,11] and models such as CERES [12,13], GROPGRO [14], AFRCWHEAT [15] and CropSyst [16] based on their description of light extinction in plant canopies. Campbell [18] expressed the extinction coefficient of the population using a function based on the angle of the sun and the leaf angle distribution. The application of these methods to estimate light distribution remains limited, and a more complete model is required
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