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Deep Learning & Transfer Learning: CNNs for Plant Disease Detection, Classification, and Technological Innovation

Edited by:

Michael Gomez Selvaraj, PhD, Alliance of Bioversity International and International Center for Tropical Agriculture, Colombia
Junfeng Gao, PhD, University of Aberdeen, United Kingdom

Submission Status: Closed

This collection no longer accepts submissions.
 

Plant Methods is calling for submissions to our Collection on "Deep Learning & Transfer Learning: CNNs for Plant Disease Detection, Classification, and Technological Innovation". The Collection seeks to showcase cutting-edge research in deep learning and transfer learning, particularly focusing on the application of convolutional neural networks for plant disease detection, classification, and technological innovation. 

Sub-topics may include but are not limited to:
- Novel CNN architectures for plant disease detection
- Transfer learning approaches for plant disease classification
- Integration of multi-modal data for improved disease detection
- Interdisciplinary approaches combining deep learning with traditional plant science disciplines
- Automation of disease diagnosis and its impact on agricultural sustainability
- Generative AI approaches (like LLMs) for plant disease research

Image credit: © Felipe Caparrós / stock.adobe.com

New Content ItemThis Collection supports and amplifies research related to SDG [9] & SDG [15]: Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure and Life on Land.

  1. Fusarium head blight (FHB), caused by the Fusarium species complex, significantly endangers wheat yield and safety. Accurate and timely assessment of FHB epidemic level in the field is crucial for effective disea...

    Authors: Rui Mao, Hongli Yuan, Feilong Li, Ying Shi, Jia Zhou, Xuemei Hu and Xiaoping Hu
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:133
  2. Arabidopsis thaliana is the leading model plant used to study plant-pathogen interactions. High-throughput phenotyping allows for the simultaneous study of many plants with high-frequency image acquisition. Never...

    Authors: Felicià Maviane Maciá, Sabine Wiedemann-Merdinoglu, David Rousseau and Nemo Peeters
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:128
  3. In rice pest management, accurate pest detection is critical for intelligent agricultural systems, yet challenges like limited dataset availability, pest occlusion, and insufficient small object detection accu...

    Authors: Jun Qiang, Li Zhao, Hongming Wang, Tianqi Xu, Qihang Jia and Lixiang Sun
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:121
  4. Tomato early blight, caused by Alternaria solani, poses a significant threat to crop yields. Existing detection methods often struggle to accurately identify small or multi-scale lesions, particularly in early st...

    Authors: Xiuying Tang, Zhongqing Sun, Linlin Yang, Qin Chen, Zhenglin Liu, Pei Wang and Yonghua Zhang
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:118
  5. Wheat is significantly impacted by fungal diseases, which result in severe economic losses. These diseases result from pathogenic spores invading wheat. Rapid and accurate detection of these spores is essentia...

    Authors: Zhizhou Ren, Kun Liang, Yingqi Zhang, Jinpeng Song, Xiaoxiao Wu, Chi Zhang, Xiuming Mei, Yi Zhang and Xin Liu
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:117
  6. Spikelet number, a core phenotypic parameter for wheat yield composition, requires precise estimation through accurate spike contour extraction and differentiation between grain surfaces and spikelet surfaces....

    Authors: Xin Xu, Haiyang Zhang, Jiangchuan Lu, Ziyi Guo, Juanjuan Zhang, Jibo Yue, Hongbo Qiao and Xinming Ma
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:116
  7. Plant growth prediction assists physiologists and botanists in analyzing future development trends, thereby shortening experimental cycles and reducing costs. Traditional growth prediction methods mainly focus...

    Authors: Xinyi Wang, Shilong Liu, Zhihao Wang, Zedong Geng, Weikun Li, Chengxiu Wu, Yingjie Xiao, Wanneng Yang and Lingfeng Duan
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:110
  8. Rice diseases pose a severe threat to global food security, while traditional detection methods suffer from low efficiency and dependence on manual expertise. To address the challenges of insufficient feature ...

    Authors: Hanyu Song, Xinyue Huang, Ziqiang Wang, Jianwei Hu, Huasheng Zhang and Hui Yang
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:108
  9. Deep learning demonstrates strong generalisation capabilities, driving substantial progress in plant disease recognition systems. However, current methods are predominantly optimised for offline implementation...

    Authors: Lunhong Lou, Jianwu Lin, Lin You, Xin Zhang, Tomislav Cernava, Hanyu Lu and Xiaoyulong Chen
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:105
  10. Apple Marssonina blotch (AMB) is a major disease causing pre-mature defoliation. The occurrence of AMB will lead to serious production decline and economic losses. The precise identification of AMB outbreaks and ...

    Authors: Wenjie Zhang, Chengjian Zhang, Riqiang Chen, Bo Xu, Hao Yang, Haikuan Feng, Dan Zhao, Baoguo Wu, Chunjiang Zhao and Guijun Yang
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:102
  11. Citrus leaf diseases significantly affect production efficiency and fruit quality in the citrus industry. To effectively identify and classify citrus leaf diseases, this study proposed a classification approac...

    Authors: Hongyan Zhu, Dani Wang, Yuzhen Wei, Pengcheng Wang and Min Su
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:88
  12. Phenotypic characterization of mature soybean pods is a crucial aspect of breeding programs, yet efficiently obtaining accurate pod phenotypic parameters remains a major challenge. Recent advances in deep lear...

    Authors: Fei Liu, Hang Liu, Qiong Wu, Zhongzhi Han, Shanchen Pang, Shudong Wang and Longgang Zhao
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:82
  13. Pear leaf diseases represent one of the major challenges in agriculture, significantly affecting fruit quality and reducing overall yield. With the advancement of precision agriculture, accurate identification...

    Authors: Jie Ding, Wenwen Xu, Xin Shu, Wenyu Wang, Shuxia Chen and Yunzhi Wu
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:74
  14. Maize is the most produced crop in the world, exceeding wheat and rice production. However, its yield is often affected by various leaf diseases. Early identification of maize leaf disease through easily acces...

    Authors: Getnet Tigabie Askale, Achenef Behulu Yibel, Belayneh Matebie Taye and Gashaw Desalegn Wubneh
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:72
  15. Pine wood nematode (PWN), a major international quarantined forest pest, has resulted in significant loss to the pine forest resources, posing a serious threat to global forest ecosystems. Quick and accurate i...

    Authors: Qiangjia Wu, Meixiang Chen, Hao Shi, Tongchuan Yi, Gang Xu, Weijia Wang and Ruirui Zhang
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:68
  16. Pest management is essential for agricultural production and food security, as pests can cause significant crop losses and economic impact. Early pest detection is key to timely intervention. While object dete...

    Authors: Rui Fu, Shiyu Wang, Mingqiu Dong, Hao Sun, Mohammed Abdulhakim Al-Absi, Kaijie Zhang, Qian Chen, Liqun Xiao, Xuewei Wang and Ye Li
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:53
  17. Plant diseases adversely affect the agricultural sector by substantially affecting food security and limiting production. We introduce PlantCareNet, a novel, automated, end-to-end diagnostic system for plant d...

    Authors: Muhaiminul Islam, AKM Azad, Shifat E. Arman, Salem A. Alyami and Md Mehedi Hasan
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:52
  18. Deep learning-based computer vision technology significantly improves the accuracy and efficiency of crop disease detection. However, the scarcity of crop disease images leads to insufficient training data, li...

    Authors: Chao Wang, Yuting Xia, Lunlong Xia, Qingyong Wang and Lichuan Gu
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:46
  19. Accurate and efficient assessment of highland barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) density is crucial for optimizing cultivation and management practices. However, challenges such as overlapping spikes in unmanned aerial ...

    Authors: Minghui Cai, Hui Deng, Jianwei Cai, Weipeng Guo, Zhipeng Hu, Dongzheng Yu and Houxi Zhang
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:42
  20. Hyperspectral imaging combined with machine learning offers a promising, cost-effective alternative to invasive chemical analysis for early plant disease detection. In this study, the use of 3D Convolutional N...

    Authors: Rizos-Theodoros Chadoulis, Ioannis Livieratos, Ioannis Manakos, Theodore Spanos, Zeinab Marouni, Christos Kalogeropoulos and Constantine Kotropoulos
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:15
  21. Throughout their lifetime, trees store valuable environmental information within their wood. Unlocking this information requires quantitative analysis, in most cases of the surface of wood. The conventional pa...

    Authors: Jan Van den Bulcke, Louis Verschuren, Ruben De Blaere, Simon Vansuyt, Maxime Dekegeleer, Pierre Kibleur, Olivier Pieters, Tom De Mil, Wannes Hubau, Hans Beeckman, Joris Van Acker and Francis wyffels
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:11
  22. Apricot trees, serving as critical agricultural resources, hold a significant role within the agricultural domain. Conventional methods for detecting pests and diseases in these trees are notably labor-intensi...

    Authors: Minglang Li, Zhiyong Tao, Wentao Yan, Sen Lin, Kaihao Feng, Zeyi Zhang and Yurong Jing
    Citation: Plant Methods 2025 21:4

Meet the Guest Editors

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Michael Gomez Selvaraj, PhD, Alliance of Bioversity International and International Center for Tropical Agriculture, Colombia

Michael Gomez Selvaraj is a visionary leader in agricultural research, with a specific focus on harnessing the power of Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) to revolutionize cropping system agronomy. As the Leader of the Phenomics platform at the Alliance of Bioversity and CIAT within CGIAR, his goal is to envision a world where regenerative agriculture and data-driven innovation converge to create sustainable solutions. Passionate about addressing the most pressing challenges in agriculture, he envisions a future where the information revolution brought about by A.I. transforms the agricultural research landscape.

Junfeng Gao, PhD, University of Aberdeen, United Kingdom

Junfeng Jerevon Gao is currently working as an assistant professor in the department of computer science at the University of Aberdeen, UK. His research mainly focuses on the development of computational models using computer vision and deep learning in the domain of Agri-Food, particularly in the robotic applications of selective harvesting and crop care. He received his PhD at Ghent University. Previously, he also worked at Wageningen University, University of Nottingham, SLU Sweden on robotics and computer vision. He was a visiting researcher at Cornell University in 2022, KU Leuven in 2023. 


 

About the Collection

Plant Methods is calling for submissions to our Collection on "Deep Learning & Transfer Learning: CNNs for Plant Disease Detection, Classification, and Technological Innovation". The advancement of deep learning and transfer learning techniques, particularly convolutional neural networks (CNNs), has revolutionized the field of plant disease detection and classification. These innovations have enabled the development of sophisticated image processing algorithms that can accurately identify and classify plant diseases, leading to improved crop management and agricultural sustainability. As we continue to make strides in this area, it is crucial to understand the importance of these advancements. 

Significant advances have already been made in this field, with the application of CNNs and transfer learning leading to remarkable improvements in plant disease detection and classification accuracy. These technologies have enabled the automation of disease diagnosis, reducing the reliance on manual inspection, and significantly expediting the identification of plant diseases. Furthermore, the integration of deep learning techniques with traditional plant science disciplines has facilitated a more comprehensive understanding of plant-pathogen interactions and disease mechanisms. Looking ahead, the potential for further advances in this area is vast. Continued research and innovation in deep learning and transfer learning are expected to lead to the development of more robust and interpretable CNN models tailored specifically for plant disease detection. Additionally, the integration of multi-modal data, including spectral and temporal information, with CNN-based approaches holds promise for enhancing the accuracy and reliability of disease classification. Furthermore, the exploration of transfer learning methodologies across different plant species and diseases is anticipated to yield generalized models with broader applicability, thereby contributing to the development of scalable solutions for diverse agricultural settings.

The Collection seeks to showcase cutting-edge research in deep learning and transfer learning, particularly focusing on the application of convolutional neural networks for plant disease detection, classification, and technological innovation. We invite contributions that explore novel methodologies, innovative applications, and interdisciplinary approaches in this rapidly evolving field. Sub-topics may include but are not limited to:
- Novel CNN architectures for plant disease detection
- Transfer learning approaches for plant disease classification
- Integration of multi-modal data for improved disease detection
- Interdisciplinary approaches combining deep learning with traditional plant science disciplines
- Automation of disease diagnosis and its impact on agricultural sustainability
-Generative AI approaches (like LLMs) for plant disease research

Image credit: © Felipe Caparrós / stock.adobe.com

Submission Guidelines

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This Collection welcomes submission of reviews and research articles. Should you wish to submit a different article type, please read our submission guidelines to confirm that type is accepted by the journal. 

Articles for this Collection should be submitted via our submission system. Please, select the appropriate Collection title “Deep Learning & Transfer Learning: CNNs for Plant Disease Detection, Classification, and Technological Innovation" under the “Details” tab during the submission stage.

Articles will undergo the journal’s standard peer-review process and are subject to all the journal’s standard policies. Articles will be added to the Collection as they are published.

The Editors have no competing interests with the submissions which they handle through the peer-review process. The peer-review of any submissions for which the Editors have competing interests is handled by another Editorial Board Member who has no competing interests.