Development and Evaluation of Plant Growth Models: Methodology and Implementation in the PYGMALION platform

Mathematical models of plant growth are generally characterized by a large number of interacting processes, a large number of model parameters and costly experimental data acquisition. Such complexities make model parameterization a difficult process. Moreover, there is a large variety of models that coexist in the literature with generally an absence of benchmarking between the different approaches and insufficient model evaluation. In this context, this paper aims at enhancing good modelling practices in the plant growth modelling community and at increasing model design efficiency. It gives an overview of the different steps in modelling and specify them in the case of plant growth models specifically regarding their above mentioned characteristics.