Canopy Light Interception

A horizontal plane can be passed vertically down through virtual cotton plants to calculate how much light is intercepted at different levels in the canopy. Only one plant is shown here to convey the idea simply but a stand of plants would be used in practical studies. The technique can be used to calculate how efficiency of light interception is affected by changing values in the virtual plant model for such variables as length of petiole, shape of leaf lamina, length of internodes and angles of leaves. Top views of sections at different heights are shown on the right.

Last updated: Jim Hanan, 15 January 1997