The High Resolution Plant Phenomics Centre (HRPPC), is a world class facility located at CSIRO’s Black Mountain laboratories and ANU in Canberra. It provides an important new set of tools for Australian and International plant scientists. The centre exploits advances in robotics, imaging and computing to enable sensitive, non-destructive, high-throughput analysis of plant growth, function and performance. Plants are grown under controlled conditions in growth cabinets or in the field.

The HRPPC provides a suite of analytical tools, packaged into four modules; the Small Model Plant Module, Crop Plant Shoot Module, Root Module and Gateway to Field Module.

Model Plant Module

The Model Plant Module provides high throughput growth and deep phenotyping of small seedlings using digital growth and morphological analysis, pulse modulated chlorophyll fluorescence and infra-red thermography for photosynthetic and plant transpiration measurements. [read more]

Crop Plant Shoot Module

The Crop Plant Shoot Module includes 3D imaging for plant architecture and growth analysis, allowing multiple images to be overlayed. Hyperspectral reflectance for plant chemical composition and stress detection, pulse modulated chlorophyll fluorescence imaging and gas exchange for non-invasive estimation of photosynthesis, infrared thermography and carbon isotope discrimination for water use efficiency screening. This module is suitable for medium throughput screening and validation of novel screening methods in a wide range of cereals, annual and perennial plants of agricultural importance. [read more]

Crop Plant Root Module

The Crop Plant Root Module comprises destructive and non-destructive measurement of root growth, architecture, morphology, and water uptake in controlled environments and in the field. Well-established methods include screening of root growth and architecture in controlled conditions. Controlled environment screening has been routinely coupled to field coring of seedling and adult plants for roots and soil water content, and indirect soil moisture measurements to detect the presence and function of roots. New non-invasive methods are in development for their second year in controlled and field conditions. These include optical, electrical resistance, thermal imaging infra-red and near infra-red measurements. [read more]

Crop Plant Field Module

The Crop Plant Field Module is an important part of validating controlled environment screening technologies and provides a powerful high throughput set of tools. The environmental conditions and plant performance in the field can be quantified with developing technologies like stereophotography, LIDAR, hyperspectral reflectance, leaf thermography, electrical root detection, sensor networks and other developing technologies. These technologies will be integrated into spatial, climatic and precision agricultural data bases by researchers across Australia. The Field Module utilises a number of technologies developed by the centre for field analysis such as The Phenomobile, Phenonet, Tethered Blimp and Phenotower. [read more]

Cropatron - Translation to Field Module

This module represents two approaches to field simulation; a semi-static facility, the Cropatron, with a high degree of environmental control, containment and high resolution monitoring and a mobile facility: the Field Mobile Cropatron which can be placed over part of a crop in the field to control the growth environment, or for a short term, the measurement environment. [read more]

View Roadshow Presentation [2mb PDF]