A parametric maize leaf model quantifying morphology and geometry via 3D triangle mesh

Abstract

Maize leaf morphology is poorly investigated because quantifying maize leaf geometry is still an open question due to the complexity of the 3D curved shape. By utilization of geometric curves, maize leaf morphology can be effectively described parametrically and quantitatively. We divided maize leaf into three components: midrib, cross-section and blade contour. Each component is represented by parametric curves and controlled by a group of parameters. A 3D maize leaf model is generated by translation, rotation and scaling of the three components. We demonstrated the parametric maize leaf model allows the applications of leaf geometry analysis, leaf-level radiation capture simulation and dataset synthesis for phenotyping pipeline. The parametric maize leaf model is configurable, extensible and scalable, allowing it to be used in agricultural digital-twin and high-accuracy phenotyping. It also has potential to serve as a platform for maize biophysical and biomechanical studies. The code for 3D maize leaf model generation is available at https://github.com/xzcppm/parametric_maize_leaf.