A new node at The University of Western Australia will help transform plant phenotyping and drive the growth of crops resilient to climate change while enabling more sustainable agricultural practices.
The Australian Plant Phenomics Network today announced the launch of two new Western Australian nodes at The University of Western Australia and the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development.
Image: Peter Bird, GRDC, Dr Hammad Khan, DPIRD, Minister Jackie Jarvis, Dr Nic Taylor, UWA, Dr Parwinder Kaur, MLC, Richard Dickmann, APPN.
Plant phenomics combines biology, engineering, robotics, remote sensing and data science to measure how plant genetics are expressed under different growing conditions.
Associate Professor Nic Taylor, director of the Australian Plant Phenomics Network node at UWA, said breeders and scientists would benefit from the experimental design, data acquisition and data analysis undertaken at the facility.
"Together with our research partners, we will help develop higher-yielding and more nutritious crop varieties that have a greater resilience to climate change," Associate Professor Taylor said.
"It will enable the identification and isolation of desirable traits in new cultivars, often years faster than conventional breeding trials."
Funding from the partners will provide more than $15 million over five years, to drive innovation through plant phenotyping.
A state-of-the-art digital phenotyping for controlled environments, including a dedicated extreme climate facility, and drone phenotyping will be funded at UWA.
UWA Centre for Water and Spatial Science co-director Associate Professor Nik Callow will lead the drone phenotyping field component that includes multispectral, hyperspectral and LiDAR drones and will also include ground-based robots and sensors.
"Drone pilots and data science staff will be able to go from paddock drone data collection to obtaining advanced data on plant traits across thousands of plots, transforming how we do agricultural research in WA," Associate Professor Callow said.
The new nodes reflect a collaborative partnership between the Australian Government's National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy, the Western Australian Government through DPIRD and Jobs, Tourism, Science and Innovation, UWA and the Grains Research and Development Corporation.
