Belgium
EMPHASIS-Belgium
Website: https://emphasis-belgium.sites.vib.be/en
General enquiries: emphasis@vib.be
Belgium's leadership in plant phenotyping
Belgium has a longstanding expertise in the short history of plant phenotyping. It pioneered the field of digital phenotyping and is an early adopter of many plant phenotyping technologies. Moreover, Belgium is an early supporter of EMPHASIS, both on the political and scientific level, by its involvement in multiple phases of the European research infrastructure establishment. It is selected as the statutory seat country for EMPHASIS-ERIC, with the central coordination office being hosted by the VIB.
The role of EMPHASIS-Belgium
EMPHASIS-Belgium serves as the National Node within the EMPHASIS, in readiness for its transition to an ERIC, and is dedicated to advancing plant phenotyping across scientific, technological, and agricultural domains. As part of the broader EMPHASIS initiative, EMPHASIS-Belgium plays a pivotal role in coordinating and integrating national efforts to support cutting-edge phenotyping research, ensuring Belgium’s active contribution to a pan-European strategy for sustainable agriculture and food security.
National collaboration and infrastructure
The ambition of EMPHASIS-Belgium is to foster innovation in multiscale plant phenotyping —from lab to field, and from cellular to satellite levels—by integrating complementary infrastructures and a strong consortium of national partners: VIB, ILVO and VITO. VIB is a leading institute in controlled environment phenotyping, ILVO focuses on intensive field phenotyping activities, and VITO supports lean drone and satellite-based phenotyping in production fields. Together, EMPHASIS-Belgium provides access multi-disciplinary expertise, state-of-the-art phenotyping facilities, such as the Phenovision, IPSA, and HYDRAS platforms, and digital services and information systems, like PIPPA, MAPEO, and Terrascope.
Connecting national and European communities
The Node acts as a bridge between the national actors and the European infrastructure, facilitating knowledge exchange, joint research, and harmonized standards. The EMPHASIS-Belgium community is vibrant and multidisciplinary, encompassing plant scientists, breeders, technologists, and data analysts.
Engagement and collaboration
Active engagements with stakeholders through workshops, training events, and open-access initiatives, ensures that the infrastructure remains responsive to the evolving needs of users. By promoting FAIR data principles and interoperability, EMPHASIS-Belgium contributes to a more transparent and collaborative research environment. It aims to strengthen Belgium’s position in the global plant research landscape by promoting collaboration between academia, industry, and policy stakeholders.
More Community members
Austria
APPN brings together Austria’s plant phenotyping community; researchers, breeders, data scientists, technology developers to build shared infrastructure and methods, promote collaboration, and raise the profile of phenotyping nationally and in Europe
France
PHENOME-EMPHASIS provides indoor and field platforms with linked biochemistry, imaging, and data services to evaluate genotypes in diverse settings, advancing climate resilience and agroecology transitions.
Ireland
Irish agriculture drives crop yield and disease research. PPN-Ireland (2016), an SFI-backed network, connects eight institutes with key phenotyping facilities. Teagasc integrates diverse crop data with molecular tools to enhance global breeding innovation.
Israel
More information coming soon.
Italy
The Italian Plant Phenotyping Network (PHEN-ITALY) is an 18-partner Joint Research Unit (JRU). Its mission is to promote and coordinate the scientific community and relevant stakeholders’ participation in national plant phenotyping research.
Netherlands
NPEC (Wageningen/Utrecht/NWO) is a high-throughput, high-resolution phenotyping facility. It provides above and below-ground data that dramatically accelerates the breeding of novel, adaptive crops—crucial for future food security—by analysing plant performance under diverse biotic/abiotic factors.
Norway
PheNo provides a distributed national infrastructure across Norway for high-resolution controlled environment, field and seed phenotyping and data analysis services to support research and educational needs in academia and industry.
Portugal
EMPHASIS.PT established a cohesive phenotyping network (12 institutes + 2 labs) across mainland Portugal and Madeira. Leveraging diverse agro-climates, they invest in advanced technologies (drone/satellite imaging, metabolomics) to study plant adaptation, strengthen international standing, and drive capacity in EU projects.
Switzerland
The SPPN's research spans from fundamental ecological/biological studies using model plants to applied research on field and orchard crops. It provides comprehensive phenotyping infrastructure available at multiple scales: landscape, field, individual plant, and organ levels.
United Kingdom
PhenomUK comprises 15 research centres/universities housing controlled and field phenotyping platforms. These are organized into 8 targeted clusters: photophysiology, 3D/growth, health/disease, protected environments, drones, deep field, advancing practice, and digital.