A phenotype is an organism’s observable characteristics, like growing towards the light, or having a stripy tail, or being one of those people who can make their tongue roll up. An organism’s phenotype is the result of the genetic characteristics it has – its genotype – and the environment in which it lives. For example, a plant’s genotype might mean it can grow quickly and become tall, but if its environment lacks water, it’s likely to have a slow-growing and short phenotype.”
“We can study which seed phenotypes appear to be linked to desirable crop phenotypes, such as a high germination rate, or the ability to survive in dry conditions; in other words, we can make predictions about which seeds are likely to grow into good crops. And if we have controlled the environment in which we’re doing this research, we can be reasonably confident that these “good” seed phenotypes are mostly due not to variation in environmental conditions, but to properties of the seeds themselves: their genotype.”
Source: SeedGerm Raspberry Pi-based platform for automated seed imaging
