8 TradeFarmMachinery.com.au THE TRACTOR YOU WANT IS NOW EASIER TO FIND
PRODUCT NEWS
E
quipped with cutting-edge technologies, controlled by a
joystick and measuring 1.93m high, the phenoMobile Lite
might look a little out of place in most farmers’ sheds.
But the machine, the product of 11 years of Research and
Development by the CSIRO-led node of the Australian Plant
Phenomics Facility (APPF), could become a more common sight
on Australian farms in near future, as CSIRO seeks a partner to
help bring the product to a wider market.
It comes as phenotyping, the process of measuring the traits of
a plant, becomes more common on farms worldwide as farmers
try to increase their yield in more marginal environmental
conditions.
Xavier Sirault, the director of the High Resolution Plant
Phenomics Centre at CSIRO, tells Farms & Farm Machinery
that phenotyping may include assessing a plant’s chemical
composition – such as identifying sugar cane plants with more
sugar content, or grains with higher protein levels – or a plant’s
morphological characteristics, such as optimising plant height,
or distribution of leaf area to capture more light.
But it can also look at how a plant interacts with the
environment – such as under a current CSIRO project, where the
organisation is aiming to identify the genes that help plants use
water more efficiently.
“To do this we are creating plant populations, crossing them
together and planting them in different locations,” Sirault says.
“A machine such as the phenoMobile Lite allows you to
quantify how each cross is behaving in a certain set of
conditions. If this behaviour is superior to the average of all
the crosses, you have got genes of interest – and we try to
then isolate these genes to breed them into adapted varieties
in Australia.”
But the process of measuring the plants in these trials is an
intensive one – with a variety of different aspects of the plant
being measured at any one time.
“Usually hundreds to thousands of measurements are
performed to select individuals or to identify regions of the
genome that have genes of interest,” Sirault says.
“If you look at a thousand plots, today with our machine
it would probably take you a couple of hours to measure a
number of traits simultaneously – that is, to get quantification of
plant biomass, greenness, height for each of these plots.
“It would otherwise take 10 people all day to do the same
amount of work... just to harvest the plant and measure
greenness and plant height, then the next week you are going to
require those 10 people to manually process the material, and
then in three weeks’ time you will finally get the information that
you are looking for.”
The gain in efficiency and repeatability, Sirault says, could cut
the amount of time it takes to produce a new seed variety with
beneficial genetic combinations, in particular if the technology is
used at the early stages of a breeding program.
“Instead of having a person measuring plant traits a few times
during the growing season, we are using robots to do it on a
regular basis (weekly or daily) and screen many, many more
plants, so that we know when we have identified something
special,” he says.
What makes the phenoMobile Lite more efficient today is
its light detection and ranging (LiDAR) technology, which
uses light pulses to generate a precise 3D reconstruction of
a crop that researchers can analyse on a cloud-based data
visualisation platform.
However Sirault says up to 50kg of additional equipment
can be added to the vehicle, including commercially available
sensors such as the Green Seeker spectral sensor, used to
assess the nitrogen content of plants.
Measuring 2.7m long and 2.4m wide and weighing about
600kg, the phenoMobile Lite can travel at a top speed of 6km
per hour, with the operator walking behind it as it moves.
There are plans to eventually integrate other sensors into the
phenoMobile, which may include portable X-Ray technologies
and infared vision, to better identify how a plant is using water,
or accumulating biomass, as well as potentially an automated
control system – allowing the vehicle to move autonomously
along tramlines similar to those used in precision agriculture.
CSIRO research scientist and HRPPC assistant director Michael
Schaefer says experience in automated control is one of the
things he is hoping a future commercialisation partner can bring
to the phenoMobile Lite.
“One of the most important things we are looking for
in a partner is someone who has got a commitment to
manufacturing high quality products and ready to provide
post-sale services for the ongoing maintenance of the platform
because that is obviously a big issue,” he says.
“You need the production ability – someone who is going to
be able to produce these vehicles – and the financial stability
to keep that platform running,” he added, saying that there was
currently a demand for at least 15 of the machines.
“From then on the platforms could be produced as needed not
only for plant phenotyping, but also other applications, such as
forestry, farming systems and mining.”
“So that is what we are looking at, and if the partner wants to
make improvements to the vehicle that is their own prerogative
to do so.”
Expressions of interest from companies with the right
technical, manufacturing and financial capacity to taking the
phenoMobile Lite to the next stage are currently being sought.
Investors and other interested parties are encouraged to
request an EOI form from Marni Tebbutt, who can be reached via
email at [email protected].
Demonstrations and pilot studies can be organised on request,
with CSIRO aiming to find a licensee or commercialisation
partner by the end of the year.
CSIRO is looking for a
partner to help bring a
new technology to market
which could speed up and
increase the efficiency of
plant genetic research and
plant breeding. Andrew
Hobbs finds out more.
Today with our machine
it would probably take
you a couple of hours
to measure a number of
traits simultaneously.
a phenomenal opportunity