Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches

Heat stress is a critical environmental factor that adversely affects crop productivity. With the increasing frequency and intensity of heat waves and extreme weather events, heat stress has become a challenge for wheat production, which is one of the most important cereal crops. To sustain wheat pr...

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Main Authors: Neelesh Sharma, Manu Kumar, Hans D Daetwyler, Richard M Trethowan, Matthew Hayden, Surya Kant
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2024-12-01
Series:Plant Stress
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Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667064X2400246X
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author Neelesh Sharma
Manu Kumar
Hans D Daetwyler
Richard M Trethowan
Matthew Hayden
Surya Kant
author_facet Neelesh Sharma
Manu Kumar
Hans D Daetwyler
Richard M Trethowan
Matthew Hayden
Surya Kant
author_sort Neelesh Sharma
collection DOAJ
description Heat stress is a critical environmental factor that adversely affects crop productivity. With the increasing frequency and intensity of heat waves and extreme weather events, heat stress has become a challenge for wheat production, which is one of the most important cereal crops. To sustain wheat production under heat stress conditions, there is an urgent need to develop high-yielding, heat-tolerant wheat varieties. This requires characterizing the genetic and physiological mechanisms underlying heat tolerance, as well as developing efficient phenotyping methods to evaluate a large number of wheat genotypes under heat stress field conditions. In this study, we used 184 wheat genotypes that were sown at two times of sowing (TOS), i.e., optimal sowing as TOS1 and late sowing as TOS2, with higher temperatures faced by plants during heading and grain filling in TOS2. We used a combination of physiological traits, multispectral vegetative indices (VIs) derived from aerial imagery and machine learning approaches to effectively differentiate wheat genotypes for heat tolerance and susceptibility. The response of wheat genotypes to heat stress was delineated as being susceptible, moderate, and tolerant using the stress susceptibility index, percentage loss, and tolerance index. Different VIs varied significantly between the two TOS. The decline in VIs during anthesis and post-anthesis was minimal in heat tolerant genotypes compared to susceptible genotypes under TOS2. We classified the stress severity and yield using VIs with a machine learning approach. A model was created with a random forest classifier (RFC) trained to categorize genotypes based on the stress susceptibility index using Python libraries. The PCA was utilized to reduce dimensionality, and five principal components explaining 99 % of the variability were employed as input for developing the model. The RFC model achieved an accuracy of 64 % and excelled in recognizing crops under extreme stress, with a recall rate of 0.87 and an F1 score of 0.77 for the susceptible class. The model had high precision metrics, with values of 0.69, 0.42, and 0.80 for the susceptible, moderate, and tolerant classes, respectively. Our results suggest that multispectral-driven phenotypic traits can be used by breeders to select and develop wheat varieties tolerant to heat stress.
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spelling doaj-art-ee79f0768a9046979bfa0be3eb6279ba2025-08-20T02:52:27ZengElsevierPlant Stress2667-064X2024-12-011410059310.1016/j.stress.2024.100593Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approachesNeelesh Sharma0Manu Kumar1Hans D Daetwyler2Richard M Trethowan3Matthew Hayden4Surya Kant5Agriculture Victoria, Grains Innovation Park, 110 Natimuk Rd, Horsham, VIC 3400, Australia; School of Applied Systems Biology, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC 3083, AustraliaAgriculture Victoria, Grains Innovation Park, 110 Natimuk Rd, Horsham, VIC 3400, AustraliaAgriculture Victoria, Grains Innovation Park, 110 Natimuk Rd, Horsham, VIC 3400, AustraliaPlant Breeding Institute, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, The University of Sydney, Narrabri, NSW 2390, AustraliaSchool of Applied Systems Biology, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC 3083, Australia; Agriculture Victoria, AgriBio, Centre for AgriBioscience, 5 Ring Road, Bundoora, VIC 3083, AustraliaAgriculture Victoria, Grains Innovation Park, 110 Natimuk Rd, Horsham, VIC 3400, Australia; School of Applied Systems Biology, La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC 3083, Australia; Corresponding author.Heat stress is a critical environmental factor that adversely affects crop productivity. With the increasing frequency and intensity of heat waves and extreme weather events, heat stress has become a challenge for wheat production, which is one of the most important cereal crops. To sustain wheat production under heat stress conditions, there is an urgent need to develop high-yielding, heat-tolerant wheat varieties. This requires characterizing the genetic and physiological mechanisms underlying heat tolerance, as well as developing efficient phenotyping methods to evaluate a large number of wheat genotypes under heat stress field conditions. In this study, we used 184 wheat genotypes that were sown at two times of sowing (TOS), i.e., optimal sowing as TOS1 and late sowing as TOS2, with higher temperatures faced by plants during heading and grain filling in TOS2. We used a combination of physiological traits, multispectral vegetative indices (VIs) derived from aerial imagery and machine learning approaches to effectively differentiate wheat genotypes for heat tolerance and susceptibility. The response of wheat genotypes to heat stress was delineated as being susceptible, moderate, and tolerant using the stress susceptibility index, percentage loss, and tolerance index. Different VIs varied significantly between the two TOS. The decline in VIs during anthesis and post-anthesis was minimal in heat tolerant genotypes compared to susceptible genotypes under TOS2. We classified the stress severity and yield using VIs with a machine learning approach. A model was created with a random forest classifier (RFC) trained to categorize genotypes based on the stress susceptibility index using Python libraries. The PCA was utilized to reduce dimensionality, and five principal components explaining 99 % of the variability were employed as input for developing the model. The RFC model achieved an accuracy of 64 % and excelled in recognizing crops under extreme stress, with a recall rate of 0.87 and an F1 score of 0.77 for the susceptible class. The model had high precision metrics, with values of 0.69, 0.42, and 0.80 for the susceptible, moderate, and tolerant classes, respectively. Our results suggest that multispectral-driven phenotypic traits can be used by breeders to select and develop wheat varieties tolerant to heat stress.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667064X2400246XHeat stressTime of sowingStress susceptibility indexRandom forest classifier
spellingShingle Neelesh Sharma
Manu Kumar
Hans D Daetwyler
Richard M Trethowan
Matthew Hayden
Surya Kant
Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
Plant Stress
Heat stress
Time of sowing
Stress susceptibility index
Random forest classifier
title Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
title_full Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
title_fullStr Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
title_full_unstemmed Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
title_short Phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits, multispectral imagery, and machine learning approaches
title_sort phenotyping for heat stress tolerance in wheat population using physiological traits multispectral imagery and machine learning approaches
topic Heat stress
Time of sowing
Stress susceptibility index
Random forest classifier
url http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2667064X2400246X
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