Detecting crop disease in the palm of your hand

Added on 14 May 2022

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Detecting crop disease invisible to the naked eye could soon be a reality for UK farmers, thanks to the development of an innovative handheld imaging device, the Fotenix Echo. The palm-sized device, from diagnostics company Fotenix, uses light across and beyond the visible spectrum to enable the identification of plant stress.

Recent trials have shown that Echo can successfully identify the presence of disease in wheat and will now be refined for launch into the agricultural market for use by breeders, agronomists and farmers. Founder of Fotenix, Charles Veys, said: "We have been entertaining the idea for some time, in fact, our first prototype was in this form. However, the data quality was never good enough, so the system didn't make it to the catalog."

"In this incarnation, the Echo had really only been trialed internally and needed development on user ergonomics and mode of operation in an end-user setting. Enabling crop diagnostics will provide early detection of disease, mitigate its impact on crop health, and inform protection regimes to safeguard yield. We are delighted that the trials went so well and look forward to bringing this to market very soon."

Funding
The trial and evaluation work was conducted by agri-tech innovation center Crop Health and Protection (CHAP), with support from Rothamsted Research as part of the RTO Grant Support Scheme operated by Innovate UK EDGE. The scheme enables SMEs to apply for grants of up to Ł15,000 to access services offered by Research & Technology Organisations (RTOs) and the UK's Catapult network and is aimed at businesses looking to grow and scale through innovation.

In this case, funding supported the delivery of two trials, with plant material and sample scans provided to Fotenix for evaluation. In parallel, the trials were also benchmarked using the established Fotenix Delta Crop Information Platform, which currently informs global crop breeding operations.