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Accepted manuscript

Evaluating hyperspectral and machine learning approaches to classify biocontrol-induced damage on water hyacinth (Pontederia crassipes)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2026

Usman Mohammed
Affiliation:
Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, Indian River Research and Education Center, Fort Pierce, FL, USA
Stephen Lantin
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
Moses Chilenje
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
Aditya Singh
Affiliation:
Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
Carey R. Minteer*
Affiliation:
Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, Indian River Research and Education Center, Fort Pierce, FL, USA
*
Corresponding author: Carey R. Minteer; c.minteerkillian@ufl.edu
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Abstract

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Water hyacinth (Pontederia crassipes Mart. Solms) is a free-floating aquatic plant native to South America that has spread to nearly 50 countries, becoming one of the world’s most invasive aquatic weeds. In Florida, the biocontrol agents Neochetina eichhorniae and Neochetina bruchi were released in 1970s, while Megamelus scutellaris was released in 2010. Assessing the impact of these biocontrol agents is crucial in evaluating efficacy, distribution, and overall progress in management efforts. The traditional survey and monitoring methods used to evaluate the impact of biocontrol present numerous challenges in data acquisition, especially in remote areas and aquatic habitats. This study aimed to detect damage caused by Neochetina spp. and M. scutellaris on P. crassipes using hyperspectral remote sensing. Plants were exposed to varying levels of Neochetina spp. and M. scutellaris herbivory for 2 and 4 wk under laboratory conditions. After the exposure period, the plants were scanned using a visible and near-infrared hyperspectral imaging system. Two classification algorithms, partial least-squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) and support vector machine (SVM) were employed for classification. SVM achieved high classification accuracy at both low and high damage levels, with an overall training and validation accuracy of 84.9% and 78.79%, respectively, while PLS-DA only achieved high classification accuracy at high damage levels, with an overall training and validation accuracy of 56.3% and 60.38%. Based on the observed performance metrics, both algorithms demonstrated improved classification accuracy as damage increased over time. The results indicated that hyperspectral remote sensing can be used to monitor and assess biocontrol agents damage on P. crassipes.

Information

Type
Research Article
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2026. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Weed Science Society of America