Initially, drones were used in 2014, under a research funded by the Kansas Wheat Alliance and carried out by Kansas State University for efficient and fast data collection using near-infrared light to select high yielding, heat and drought resistant wheat lines.

Daljit Singh, a researcher of plant pathology at Kansas State University, points out that drones have a vast potential to assist in wheat variety development. Under the guidance of Jesse Poland, Singh mounted a point and shoot camera on a drone to study the wheat lines. “Drones at KSU captured two sets of data — normalised difference vegetative index (NDVI) and near-infrared light,” he said.

“NDVI calculates greenness of the plant and near-infrared light measures its heat resistance,” he said. If a plant reflects low infrared light, it means the plant is heat-stressed.

Earlier, data was collected through a manual field visit that would take two persons nearly two working days. Drones collect the same data with additional data sets in barely 20 minutes.