Combination of multivariate curve resolution with factorial discriminant analysis for the detection of grapevine diseases using hyperspectral imaging. A case study: flavescence dorée.

Hyperspectral imaging is an emergent technique in viticulture that can potentially detect bacterial diseases in a non-destructive manner. However, the main problem is to handle the substantial amount of information obtained from this type of data, for which reliable data analysis tools are necessary. In this work, a combination of multivariate curve resolution-alternating least squares (MCR-ALS) and factorial discriminant analysis (FDA) is proposed to detect the flavescence dorée grapevine disease from hyperspectral imaging. The main purpose of MCR-ALS in this work was to provide chemically meaningful basic spectral signatures and distribution maps of the constituents needed to describe both healthy and infected leaf images by flavescence dorée. MCR scores (distribution maps) were used as the starting information for FDA to distinguish between healthy and infected pixels/images. Such an approach is presumably more powerful than the direct use of FDA on the raw imaging data, since MCR scores are compressed and noise-filtered information on pixel properties, which makes them more suitable for discrimination analysis. High levels of correct pixel discrimination rates (CR = 85.1%) for the MCR-ALS/FDA discrimination model were obtained. The model presents a lesser ability to determine infected leaves than healthy leaves. Nevertheless, only two images were misclassified. Therefore, the proposed strategy constitutes a good approach for the detection of flavescence dorée that could be potentially used to detect other phytopathologies.