Plant Biological Imaging

UH NaPPI node, https://www.helsinki.fi/en/infrastructures/national-plant-phenotyping
UEF NaPPI node, https://www.uef.fi/fi/web/spectromics

The National Plant Phenotyping Infrastructure (NaPPI) was established during 2016 to overcome the challenges in linking genotypes to phenotypes in fundamental and applied plant research. NaPPI is a distributed research infrastructure with two nodes that have complementing activities allowing wide range of phenotyping and metabolomics services to the research community. The University of Helsinki (UH) node has fully automated high-throughput (HTP) phenotyping facilities and the University of Eastern Finland (UEF) node has a wide range of specialized imaging instruments available at its Spectromics laboratory. The UEF NaPPI node houses five hyperspectral cameras covering the wavelength range from UV to midwave IR (250 – 5500 nm), liquid- cooled UV-optimized CCD (200 – 900 nm) and EMCCD cameras, light sources for fluorescence macroscopy, e.g. deep-UV LEDs, powerful and tunable narrowband light source, and three imaging PAMs.

The UH NaPPI infrastructure composes of installation for non-invasive high-throughput morphological and physiological assessment of plant phenotypes with an auxiliary option for metabolite profiling. To evaluate morphological and physiological plant phenotypes non-invasively over the course of time the standard tools of multiple RGBs, thermal imaging set-up and two chlorophyll fluorescence imaging units (Imaging PAMs) are utilized. The UH installation has features for small plant (Compact system) as well as for large plant (Modular system) analysis, with capacities for 1080 and 270 large plants, respectively. LED illumination is adjustable with smooth spectrum, and plants can be light- or dark adapted in adaptation tunnel. These approaches allow measuring many structural and physiological parameters of samples from tiny Arabidopsis seedlings to large crops of over one-meter height. The high throughput facilities, with automated plant management (movement, weighing, watering), for large plants are in a greenhouse with environmental monitoring (relative humidity, temperature, light sensitivity and spectral quality) and for small plants in a controlled environment. In combination with the phenomics and metabolomics services the NaPPI installations provide a step towards bridging the gaps between whole-plant phenotypes of growth, development and physiology with integrated molecular profiles.

Platform services

CONTACTS

Platform Chair
Director Prof. Kurt Fagerstedt, University of Helsinki kurt.fagerstedt () helsinki.fi

Platform Coordinator
Research coordinator Docent Kristiina Himanen, UH NaPPI node kristiina.himanen () helsinki.fi

Vice Director
Prof. Markku Keinänen, University of Eastern Finland NaPPI node markku.keinanen () uef.fi