Nonspectroscopic imaging for quantitative chlorophyll sensing.

Nondestructive imaging of physiological changes in plants has been intensively used as an invaluable tool for visualizing heterogeneous responses to various types of abiotic and biotic stress. However, conventional approaches often have intrinsic limitations for quantitative analyses, requiring bulky and expensive optical instruments for capturing full spectral information. We report a spectrometerless (or spectrometer-free) reflectance imaging method that allows for nondestructive and quantitative chlorophyll imaging in individual leaves in situ in a handheld device format. The combination of a handheld-type imaging system and a hyperspectral reconstruction algorithm from an RGB camera offers simple instrumentation and operation while avoiding the use of an imaging spectrograph or tunable color filter. This platform could potentially be integrated into a compact, inexpensive, and portable system, while being of great value in high-throughput phenotyping facilities and laboratory settings. © 2016 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE) [DOI: 10.1117/1.JBO.21.1.016008]