MCANENY Rhianna

Supervisors : M. Weiss, R. Lopez-Lozano (CAPTE)

Co-Supervisor : J. Labrosse (HIPHEN)

Durée: 2023-2026

Topic : THE USE OF HIGH-RESOLUTION SATELLITES FOR CROP PHENOTYPING
 
As a first-year doctoral student at INRAE, my research focuses on assessing the potential contribution of high-resolution satellite observation systems (≤10 meters spatial resolution and ≤5 days temporal resolution) for monitoring phenotyping trials or agricultural techniques on farmers' plots.
The thesis initially focuses on the study of an experimental phenotyping network comprising agricultural installations and plots dedicated to wheat and maize. This initiative stems from projects conducted at INRAE and HIPHEN, who began their collaboration at UMT CAPTE. These plots are monitored by satellite images, with the evaluation of radiometric and geometric quality being carried out. The aim is to harmonize these data with satellites such as Sentinel 2 to ensure optimal accuracy and consistency. Subsequently, algorithms will be developed to estimate various biophysical traits of crops, such as Leaf Area Index (LAI), Ground Cover Fraction (GCF), Fraction of Intercepted Photosynthetically Active Radiation (fIPAR), and Chlorophyll Concentration (CCC), from satellite data. Finally, the analysis of the spatio-temporal dynamics of these traits will be conducted, taking into account the presence of clouds and minimizing residual effects. Smoothing and modeling techniques will be employed to obtain coherent and robust dynamics.