DSSS - Custom low-cost "robotics" and AI: Plant-parasitic nematode phenotyping, at scale

Plant-parasitic nematodes are a major threat, and in some crops the dominant threat, to food security throughout the world. A central tenet of the discipline is to advance our understanding of plant-parasitic nematode biology in sufficient detail to alleviate their threat to food security. There is an expectation that the development of functional genetic tools will accelerate the progress of research on plant-parasitic nematodes, and thereby the development of novel control solutions.

This talk will describe both recent and rapid progress in developing low-cost, AI-powered, phenotyping using 3D printing and Raspberry Pi computers. In developing this technology to address a bottle neck in our research, something more important emerged - the ability to be truly holistic (i.e. phenotyping every individual pathogen in the whole host) and dynamic (i.e. across the complete life cycle of the pathogen) in our analysis of host infection. We think this approach sets a precedent for pathology in general, and will allow genetic dissection of entirely new aspects of host-pathogen interactions.