AI used in revealing biological secrets of crop seeds

After eight years of groundbreaking interdisciplinary collaboration, a Chinese research team has pioneered a revolutionary leap in agricultural technology: a nondestructive testing system that performs "seed CT scans" to assess the vitality of individual seeds.

The innovation, led by Yu Yinghong, a researcher at the Hunan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, is embodied in a prototype device that combines cutting-edge laser spectroscopy and artificial intelligence to reveal the biological secrets within seeds — without damaging them — ushering in a new era of precision agriculture.

Collaborating with the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the CAS Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics, the interdisciplinary team established an optical nondestructive testing system based on supercontinuum laser spectroscopy.