Functional relationships to estimate Morphogenetically Active Radiation (MAR) from PAR and solar broadband irradiance measurements: The case of a sorghum crop

Light quality plays a key role in higher plants’ morphogenesis. In most plant models, light is considered as a consumable resource and plants are assumed blind to light signals. However, prior to any effort for modelling photomorphogenetic mechanisms, it is necessary to characterise the spatial distribution of the Morphogenetically Active Radiation (MAR) over and within plant canopies. Measurements of local photosynthetic photon flux density (PPFD) and broadband irradiance (Es) are easy to carry out by using small sensors. Thus, the distribution of the MAR within a canopy can be estimated whenever the functional relationships between these measurements and the photon flux within any spectral band are known. The objective of this work was to determine these functional relationships from the light spectra received above and at various positions around a target plant within a growing sorghum crop. The MAR components considered in this work are related either to photon flux densities in various wavebands between 330 and 950 nm or to the ratio between two photon flux densities. A part of the photon flux-related variables is strictly included in the PAR band and might be estimated from PPFD measurements using linear relationships. The other variables are related to both PPFD and Es by multiple linear relationships. The phytochrome photoequilibrium and the red to far-red ratios were related to the relative transmitted PPFD and to the ratio PPFD/Es within the canopy using a non-linear model. Models were validated against an independent set of data. We demonstrate that the MAR components within a sorghum crop can be accurately estimated with the functional relationships presented in this paper.