ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/isprsjprs

Field-level crop yield estimation with PRISMA and Sentinel-2

Michael Marshall a, *, Mariana Belgiu a, Mirco Boschetti b, Monica Pepe b, Alfred Stein a,
Andy Nelson a
a
Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation, University of Twente, Hengelosestraat 99, 7514 AE Enschede, the Netherlands
b
Institute for Electromagnetic Sensing of the Environment, Italian National Research Council, Via Bassini 15, Milan 20133, Italy

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Satellite image data deliver consistent and frequent information for crop yield estimation over large areas.
Agriculture Hyperspectral narrowbands are more sensitive spectrally to changes in crop growth than multispectral broad­
Imaging spectroscopy bands but few studies quantified the gains in the former over the later. The PRecursore IperSpettrale della
Hyperspectral
Missione Applicativa (PRISMA) mission offers narrow (≤10 nm) band capability across the full optical range. The
Remote sensing
multispectral broadband Sentinel-2 mission carries four experimental red-edge and near infrared (NIR) hyper­
Machine learning
Random forest spectral narrow (≤20 nm) bands. We compared the performance of PRISMA and Sentinel-2 spectral bands at
important phases of crop development (vegetative, reproductive, maturity) in estimating field-level biomass and
yield for corn, rice, soybean, and wheat. We selected three data-driven methods: two-band vegetation indices
(TBVIs), partial least squares regression (PLSR), and random forest (RF). The PRISMA and Sentinel-2 models on
average explained approximately 20% more variability in biomass and yield with RF than TBVIs and PLSR. The
mean RMSE of the PRISMA RF models was 0.42 and 0.17 kg m− 2, which was lower than the Sentinel-2 RF models
(0.48 and 0.18 kg m− 2). Multidate image (seasonal) model performance was generally higher than single-date
image model performance. PRISMA shortwave infrared narrowbands and Sentinel-2 red-edge and near
infrared bands were among the top-performing spectral regions. The results highlight potential complementarity
between the PRISMA and Sentinel-2 missions for predicting crop biomass and yield. The results also show the
benefits, limitations, and pitfalls of hyperspectral imaging in agricultural monitoring, which is important for
upcoming operational hyperspectral missions, such as ESA CHIME and NASA Surface Biology and Geology
(formerly HysPIRI).

1. Introduction Machine learning and other data-driven methods are increasingly

Crop yield is the marketable fraction of aboveground biomass
accumulated over a growing season for food, feed, fiber or oil (Hay,
1995). It varies widely over space and time because of differences in
cultivars (Genetic – G), environmental conditions (Environment – E),
and agronomic practices (Management – M): G × E × M (Ben-Ari and
Makowski, 2016; Licker et al., 2010; Ray et al., 2015). Crop models
typically account for the cumulative effects of G × E × M with seasonal
meteorological and other geospatial information. Satellite image data
are an important input to the models because they capture eco-
physiological conditions on the ground consistently and frequently,
and they offer the possibility to do so over large areas (Doraiswamy
et al., 2003). Studies that combine data-driven crop models and
emerging EO technology are a promising line of research and inform
agricultural monitoring system development (Jones et al., 2017).
employed for crop modeling because of the challenges of process-based
methods to account for the complex interactions governing yield (Leng
and Hall, 2020). At the same time, modern processing cycles substitute
or integrate multispectral broadband optical data with satellite image
data capturing extra spectral features related to crop growth and
development (Weiss et al., 2020).
Early data-driven yield models consisted of simple regression re­
lationships with vegetation indices (e.g., normalized difference index­
—NDVI) or biophysical features (e.g., leaf area index—LAI) that track
the evolution of crop canopy spectral reflectance patterns over the
growing season (Moulin et al., 1998). The relationships were based on
the principle of light use efficiency: biomass accumulation is propor­
tional to the amount of solar radiation absorbed by canopies during
photosynthesis (Monteith, 1969). Contemporary data-driven methods
combine spectral features with other geospatial information

* Corresponding author.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isprsjprs.2022.03.008
Received 21 October 2021; Received in revised form 17 February 2022; Accepted 11 March 2022
Available online 18 March 2022
0924-2716/© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, Inc. (ISPRS). This is an
open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
M. Marshall et al.
Fig. 1. Technical flow chart describing the methodology adopted in this study. TBVs: Two-band vegetation indices; PLSR: Partial least squares regression; RF:
Random Forest.
Fig. 2. The location of the elementary sampling units in the Bonifiche Ferraresi
study area overlaying a true color Sentinel-2 composite captured on August
11, 2020.
characterizing climate, human influences, soil, and topography to esti­
mate yield. They use powerful data mining methods to overcome the
limitations of linear regression: artificial neural networks (Feng et al.,
2021), Bayesian neural networks (Ma et al., 2021), boosted regression
(Wang et al., 2020); convolutional neural networks (Sagan et al., 2021),
partial least squares regression (PLSR) (Kowalik et al., 2014), random
forest (RF) (Hunt et al., 2019), and support vector machine (Kamir et al.,
2020).
Yield can be estimated from space with features across the optical
range (400–2500 nm) (Hank et al., 2019). Landsat images were the
workhorse given their free accessibility, global coverage, and long
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
legacy (Wulder et al., 2012). The European Space Agency (ESA)
Sentinel-2 optical sensor is increasingly used for global agricultural
monitoring because it has a higher spatial resolution (10–20 m) and
return frequency (5 days in a two-satellite constellation) than Landsat,
as well as four red-edge and near infrared (NIR) hyperspectral narrow
(≤20 nm) bands (Defourny et al., 2019). The narrowbands are more
important predictors of yield than Sentinel-2 broadbands and environ­
mental variables (Hunt et al., 2019) or Sentinel-1 radar backscatter
measures (Jin et al., 2019) because they are particularly sensitive to
changes in the chlorophyll content and the structural properties of
canopies (Frampton et al., 2013). The promising results of the Sentinel-2
experimental hyperspectral narrowbands for estimating yield and other
environmental indicators motivated the NASA Harmonized Landsat and
Sentinel-2 (HLS) project (Claverie et al., 2018) and the Italian Space
Agency PRecursore IperSpettrale della Missione Applicativa (PRISMA)
(Cogliati et al., 2021). PRISMA ushers in a new era of spaceborne
monitoring missions with narrow (≤10 nm) band capability across the
full optical range (Rast and Painter, 2019). The missions scheduled or
planned for 2022 and beyond include the German Space Agency EnMAP,
Israeli-Italian Space Agency SHALOM, ESA CHIME, and NASA Surface
Biology and Geology (formerly HysPIRI).
Studies characterize many biochemical processes and biophysical
properties related to yield with hyperspectral narrowbands (Thenkabail
et al., 2013). Illustrative examples include the relative reflectance of
chlorophyll and accessory pigments associated with photosynthetic ac­
tivity in the visible spectrum (i.e., green peak) (Gitelson and Solo­
vchenko, 2017); absorption of chlorophyll in the visible red (Thenkabail
et al., 2000); blue-shift in the red-edge inflection point caused by stress
(Schlemmer et al., 2013); reflectance in the NIR due to canopy structure;
absorption of canopy moisture across the NIR and short-wave infrared
(SWIR) (Casas et al., 2014); and absorption of non-photosynthetically
active protein and carbon base constituents in the SWIR (Féret et al.,
2021).
The estimation of yield from space with fluorescence, microwave,
and thermal emission features has received comparatively more atten­
tion by the remote sensing community than full-optical-range narrow­
band absorption and reflectance features (Guan et al., 2017). Only a few
studies were carried out to the authors’ knowledge. They showed 5–25%
gains in crop biomass and yield estimation performance with single date
Hyperion narrowbands and narrowband vegetation indices over Land­
sat, MODIS, and commercially available high-resolution broadbands
and broadband vegetation indices (Mariotto et al., 2013; Marshall and
Thenkabail, 2015a). The lack of studies could be due to the fact that
there were only two spaceborne sensors in the past (Chris from ESA and
Hyperion from NASA)—neither of which were designed for monitoring
(Rast and Painter, 2019). Further, hyperspectral data typically require
M. Marshall et al. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

Fig. 3. Satellite image acquisition dates (●) according to the three main growth stages: vegetative ( ), reproductive ( ), and maturity ( ).

Table 1
Summary of PRISMA and Sentinel-2 image attributes excluding the panchromatic bands.
Sensor Designation Spectral Range (nm) # Bands / Band # Band Width (nm) Spatial Resolution (m) Swath (km)

PRISMA VNIR 400–1000 67 9 30 30

SWIR1 1000–1700 66 11
SWIR2 1700–2500 98 8
Sentinel-2 Coastal aerosol 433–453 1 20 60 100
Blue 458–523 2 65 10
Green 543–578 3 35 10
Red 650–680 4 30 10
Red-edge 1 698–713 5 15 20
Red-edge 2 733–748 6 15 20
Red-edge 3 773–793 7 20 20
NIR 785–900 8 115 10
Narrow NIR 855–875 8a 20 20
Water vapor 935–955 9 20 60
SWIR-Cirrus 1360–1390 10 30 60
SWIR1 1565–1655 11 90 20
SWIR2 2100–2280 12 180 20

sophisticated data mining and filtering techniques given the large
number of bands and low signal-to-noise ratio (Broge and Leblanc,
2001).
The overall goal of our study was to estimate end-of-season above­
ground biomass (hereafter referred to as biomass) and yield from
PRISMA and Sentinel-2 spectral bands. PRISMA and Sentinel-2 captured
spectral changes according to the main phases of plant development
(vegetative, reproductive, maturity) for four globally important food
crops (corn, rice, soybean, wheat). Two-band vegetation indices
(TBVIs), Partial least squares regression (PLSR), and RF characterized
the spectral response to field-level estimates of biomass and yield. The
results of the three models were used to quantify the relative gains in
performance of a full-optical-range narrowband sensor over a multi­
spectral broadband spaceborne sensor with hyperspectral capability.
They also uncovered potential complementarity between PRISMA and
Sentinel-2, which is important for remote sensing data integration and
fusion.
2. Material and methods
The following sub-sections expand on the methods implemented in
our study (Fig. 1). They describe the study area over which the com­
parison was made, field-level biomass and yield data handling, PRISMA
and Sentinel-2 data handling, analytical methods (TBVIs, PLSR, RF), and
field-level assessment.
2.1. Study area
We performed the analysis in the year 2020 over fields with a total
area of 3800 ha in the Bonifiche Ferraresi farm near the city of Ferrara in
Emilia-Romagna, Italy (Fig. 2). The farm, like the surrounding area,
primarily grows food and feed crops, such as alfalfa, barley, corn, rice,
soybean, and wheat. The farm consists mainly of silty-clay and silty-clay
loam soils and is highly productive since it is reclaimed land and rich in
mineral deposits. The climate is classified as humid subtropical (Köppen
classification: Cfa) with average annual daily temperatures and monthly
precipitation of 13.6 ◦ C and 52.9 mm. Most crops are grown in the
summer when it is warm (daily mean temperature = 23.1 ◦ C) and moist
(average monthly precipitation = 54.6 mm). Wheat is planted in the fall
and harvested at the beginning of summer.
2.2. Field data
Crop cuttings were randomly harvested at the end of the growing
season (June for wheat and September for corn, soybean, rice) within 60
× 60 m2 elementary sample units (ESUs). Each ESU was homogenous in
terms of crop variety and soil type. The ESUs were randomly stratified
by crop variety and soil type however to maximize the spatial

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Fig. 4. Additional PRISMA Level-2c processing: geometric (a) and spectral (b) corrections. (
spectral signature, and corrected PRISMA spectral signature with smoothing splines.
heterogeneity among ESUs and therefore increase the robustness of the
results. Forty ESUs were demarcated using a handheld global posi­
tioning system (horizonal position error ≤ 5 m) for silage corn, rice,
soybean, and winter wheat varieties (160 ESUs in total). The dimensions
of the ESUs were double the spatial resolution of the PRISMA sensor
following Marshall and Thenkabail (2015b) to account for potential geo-
positioning errors. Except for silage corn, ten 0.25 × 0.25 m2 randomly
distributed clear-cut samples were taken within each ESU (total = 0.625
m2). Corn samples were harvested over 3 m2 instead because it is
considerably larger and wider spaced than the other crops. The samples
within an ESU were well-mixed and weighed in the field to obtain
aboveground “wet” biomass. The grain was immediately separated from
the plant material and weighed (wet yield). Wet-weight measurements
are inconsistent because the moisture content of harvested material
varies according to soil moisture and other environmental conditions
(Barrs and Weatherley, 1962). We therefore dried the samples consis­
tently in a forced air oven at 105˚C to estimate the final dry-weight
biomass and yield in kg m− 2.
2.3. PRISMA data
PRISMA was launched on March 22, 2019. After the commissioning
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
), ( ), and ( ) are the farm boundaries, uncorrected PRISMA
phase, images for our study area became available upon request in 2020.
We acquired nine images over the 2020 growing season. Three images in
May (day of year = 125, 131, 137) and one image in July (day of year =
195) were discarded because of high-cloud coverage. In the end, we had
images for the (i) vegetative and reproductive stages of corn and soy­
bean; (ii) vegetative and maturity stages of rice; and (iii) vegetative,
reproductive, and maturity stages of wheat (Fig. 3).
Images also corresponded to the early vegetative phases for corn
(jointing) and rice (tillering) when the canopies were not fully closed.
The sensor characteristics of PRISMA are shown in Table 1. The PRISMA
system consists of: (i) two hyperspectral sensors in the spectral range
400–2500 nm with overlapping narrowbands between 920 and 1010
nm, a spatial resolution of 30 m, and an average spectral resolution < 10
nm; (ii) a panchromatic camera working in the spectral range 400–700
nm with a spatial resolution of 5 m. We downloaded PRISMA narrow­
bands as Level-2D (atmospherically- and geometrically-corrected). The
data for each acquisition date were integrated into one data cube with
the “PRISMAread” package in R (Busetto, 2021). The cube consisted of
231 narrowbands ranging from 400 to 2500 nm with no overlaps.
Thirty-nine bands from 1338 to 1449 nm, 1793 to 1993 nm, and 2356 to
2393 nm were omitted from the analysis because the signals within
these ranges are degraded due to strong absorption by atmospheric CO2,
M. Marshall et al. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

Fig. 5. The statistical distribution of biomass (a) and yield (b) samples collected during the field campaign (N = 40 for each crop).

Table 2
Summary of the top-performing TBVI PRISMA model according to crop type and the day of year (DOY) of image acquisition. N is the number of samples, m and b are
the slope and intercept of the linear model. The top-performing growth phase is in bold.
Crop Growth Phase DOY λ1 λ2 N m b R2 RMSE Visible 400–680

Biomass Red-edge 680–730

Corn Vegetative 143 1656 749 39 − 0.0445 0.2602 0.54 0.03 NIR 730–1000
Vegetative 177 1047 739 40 0.0202 0.0770 0.53 0.01 SWIR1 1000–1700
Reproductive 212 579 507 37 − 0.0075 0.1679 0.45 0.01 SWIR2 1700–2500
Mean 1109 729 40 0.0239 0.0975 0.43 0.02
Rice Vegetative 177 1152 1109 40 − 0.0367 0.0577 0.46 0.03
Vegetative 212 1554 1316 37 − 0.0272 − 0.2988 0.43 0.02
Maturity 259 2035 2027 39 0.0084 0.0247 0.35 0.01
Mean 1196 918 40 ¡0.0338 0.1378 0.55 0.02
Soybean Vegetative 177 2407 2061 26 0.0496 − 0.6707 0.26 0.01
Reproductive 212 897 844 26 ¡0.0154 ¡0.0555 0.42 0.00
Mean 1088 749 26 − 0.0228 0.1451 0.32 0.00
Wheat Vegetative 97 1774 698 38 0.1016 0.1718 0.58 0.07
Reproductive 143 1284 708 39 0.0705 0.3109 0.73 0.03
Maturity 177 507 448 38 0.0346 0.2242 0.57 0.02
Mean 759 739 39 0.0207 0.0198 0.57 0.01
Yield
Corn Vegetative 143 1163 770 39 − 0.0328 0.1327 0.39 0.01
Vegetative 177 978 729 40 0.0792 0.0770 0.54 0.02
Reproductive 212 570 514 37 − 0.0154 0.1290 0.43 0.01
Mean 978 729 40 0.0455 0.1047 0.41 0.02
Rice Vegetative 177 1131 1120 40 − 0.0273 0.0125 0.24 0.01
Vegetative 212 622 514 37 − 0.0479 0.0678 0.25 0.02
Maturity 259 908 679 39 0.1458 0.4938 0.43 0.05
Mean 1141 918 40 − 0.0663 0.0690 0.33 0.03
Soybean Vegetative 177 650 463 26 0.1730 0.2887 0.44 0.02
Reproductive 212 2222 470 26 0.3395 0.4380 0.59 0.02
Mean 587 419 26 0.2890 0.3786 0.61 0.02
Wheat Vegetative 97 1784 698 38 0.2416 0.1739 0.47 0.07
Reproductive 143 1595 1543 39 0.0634 0.0337 0.68 0.01
Maturity 177 822 749 38 0.0143 0.0709 0.51 0.00
Mean 739 728 39 0.0448 0.0248 0.47 0.01

water vapor, and other atmospheric constituents (Marshall and Then­
kabail, 2014).
We took additional steps after the standard atmospheric correction
and orthorectification pre-processing to remove spectral and geometric
inconsistencies (Fig. 4). First, we manually shifted (without spatial
transformation) image corners so the images aligned with the study area
field boundaries. The geocoding error was due to a nonoperational
ground control point network at the time of data acquisition. Second, we
removed unusual anomalies in the NIR region of the spectra with the
findpeaks function (“pracma” package) in R (Kuhn, 2021) following
(Belgiu et al., 2021; Pepe et al., 2020). Finally, we used a smoothing-
spline filter to fill in data gaps.

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Fig. 6. Lambda-lambda plots highlighting regions of high and low correlations between PRISMA TBVIs and biomass for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat (d)
during the top-performing growth phase.
2.4. Sentinel-2 data
Approximately fifteen Sentinel-2 images were available over the
same period as PRISMA. The images were visually inspected online
(Copernicus Open Access Hub:). Images were downloaded for analysis if
the study area was not obscured by clouds or haze. This selection cri­
terion ensured the spectral properties were not substantially different
between PRISMA and Sentinel-2. Eight images met these criteria.
Sentinel-2 includes thirteen multispectral broadbands that span a com­
parable range to PRISMA (Fig. A1.1.). We excluded bands 1, 9, and 10
from the analysis because these bands are designated for coastal/at­
mospheric studies. Band 2 was also not included because this channel is
severely impacted by atmospheric scattering. Sentinel-2 images were
geometrically and atmospherically corrected (designated Level-2A).
Sentinel-2 was resampled from 10 to 20 m to 30 m resolution using
nearest neighbor for comparison purposes with PRISMA.
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
2.5. Analytical methods
2.5.1. Two-band hyperspectral narrowband vegetation indices (TBVIs)
The most common EO input to data-driven crop models is NDVI and
other vegetation indices (VIs) derived from two or more spectral bands
(Huete et al., 2002). VIs reduce the noise in individual bands because of
varying soil backgrounds, solar geometries, and terrain. Further, they
are easy to apply and interpret. A downside of VIs is that they discard
spectral information that could otherwise increase the signal-to-noise
ratio (Atzberger et al., 2010). TBVIs take the normalized difference
form of NDVI (Tucker, 1979):.
λ2 − λ1
TBVI = (1)
λ2 − λ1
where λ1 and λ2 is the surface reflectance captured by two different
spectral bands. We used λ-λ plots (Thenkabail et al., 2000) to identify
hotspots where TBVIs derived from PRISMA and Sentinel-2 spectral
bands during the main phases of crop development and across the
M. Marshall et al.
Fig. 7. Lambda-lambda plots highlighting regions of high and low correlations between PRISMA TBVIs and yield for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat (d)
during the top-performing growth phase.
growing season, correlated well with biomass and yield. A λ-λ plot is
essentially a cross-correlation plot in which the horizontal and vertical
coordinates are defined by the bands in a TBVI. The value at the inter­
section of λ1, λ2 indicates the coefficient of determination (R2) for a
linear model between the TBVI and biomass or yield..
2.5.2. Partial least squares regression (PLSR)
PLSR models (Wold, 1980) unlike TBVIs, account for all available
spectral information. PLSR uncovers underlying structures by projecting
features into lower dimensional space. The projections are less prone to
outliers and non-linearity than TBVIs and linear regression models. PLSR
projects the features to maximize their co-variance with the response
variable (Atzberger et al., 2010). This means the features and the
response variable in a PLSR model are interrelated. Feature loadings are
a key characteristic of PLSR. They reveal the underlying relationship of
features to the response variable relative to other features.
PLSR reduces a matrix of features (X) to an additive series of factors
or components that explain a unique proportion of the variation in the
response variable (Y). The first component explains the most variation in
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
Y, followed by the second, third and so on, until the maximum number
of components (n). The X scores (t) predict the Y-scores, which are then
used to predict Y with standard multivariate linear regression (Equation
1). The loadings (w) are weights that indicate the relative contribution
of features to explaining Y. Variables with more influence have higher
absolute loadings. Positive loadings have an opposite influence to
negative loadings. Each variable (i) receives a score and loading. ε is the
error term.
∑∑
Y⋯ = ε + wn,i tn,i (1)
n i
PLSR estimated biomass and yield from PRISMA and Sentinal-2
spectral bands retrieved during the main phases of crop development
and across the growing season. We performed 100 iterations of 10-fold
cross-validation to determine the optimal number of PLSR components
for each biomass or yield model (maximum components ≤ 5) with the R
“caret” package (Borchers, 2021).
M. Marshall et al. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

Table 3
Summary of the top-performing TBVI Sentinel-2 model according to crop type and the day of year (DOY) of image acquisition. N is the number of samples, m and b are
the slope and intercept of the linear model. The top-performing growth phase is represented in bold.
Crop Growth Phase DOY λ1 λ2 N m b R2 RMSE Blue 2

Biomass Green 3
Corn Vegetative 114 11 6 40 − 0.0197 0.2654 0.23 0.02 Red 4
Vegetative 144 12 7 40 − 0.0711 0.2810 0.54 0.05 Red-edge 1 5
Vegetative 174 8 6 40 0.0358 0.0311 0.57 0.02 Red-edge 2 6
Vegetative 194 8 6 40 0.0324 0.0745 0.45 0.03 Red-edge 3 7
Reproductive 224 8a 6 40 0.0223 0.1213 0.40 0.02 NIR 8
Reproductive 234 11 3 40 0.0257 0.4336 0.40 0.02 Narrow NIR 8a
Mean 8a 6 40 0.0486 0.0801 0.48 0.01 SWIR1 11
Rice Vegetative 174 11 6 40 ¡0.1186 0.3062 0.21 0.17 SWIR2 12
Vegetative 194 12 11 40 − 0.0160 − 0.2677 0.14 0.03
Vegetative 224 7 6 40 0.0142 0.1089 0.13 0.03
Reproductive 234 12 5 40 − 0.0277 − 0.0838 0.11 0.06
Mean 11 7 40 − 0.0410 − 0.2225 0.21 0.06
Soybean Vegetative 174 12 3 40 − 0.0798 0.3903 0.18 0.02
Vegetative 194 8 6 40 − 0.0766 0.1992 0.07 0.03
Reproductive 224 8a 7 40 − 0.0259 0.0537 0.23 0.01
Reproductive 234 8a 7 40 − 0.0477 0.0803 0.25 0.01
Mean 8a 7 40 ¡0.0151 0.0351 0.26 0.00
Wheat Vegetative 94 4 2 40 − 0.0830 0.1455 0.51 0.06
Vegetative 114 4 2 40 − 0.0892 0.1605 0.67 0.05
Reproductive 144 7 6 40 0.0481 0.0361 0.76 0.02
Maturity 174 5 2 40 0.0382 0.2919 0.62 0.02
Mean 11 7 40 − 0.0920 − 0.0562 0.67 0.05
Yield
Corn Vegetative 114 3 2 40 0.0208 0.0592 0.21 0.01
Vegetative 144 12 7 40 − 0.1342 0.2463 0.32 0.06
Vegetative 174 8a 6 40 0.0778 0.0434 0.51 0.02
Vegetative 194 8a 6 40 0.0844 0.0663 0.57 0.02
Reproductive 224 8a 6 40 0.0612 0.1029 0.49 0.02
Reproductive 234 11 3 40 0.0759 0.4043 0.58 0.02
Mean 8a 6 40 0.0486 0.0801 0.48 0.02
Rice Vegetative 174 8a 6 40 − 0.0314 0.0828 0.07 0.03
Vegetative 194 5 3 40 − 0.0524 0.2454 0.12 0.04
Vegetative 224 11 7 40 − 0.0938 − 0.3538 0.27 0.04
Reproductive 234 11 8 40 ¡0.1529 ¡0.2560 0.32 0.05
Mean 7 6 40 0.0289 0.0802 0.16 0.02
Soybean Vegetative 174 12 3 40 − 0.0798 0.3903 0.18 0.02
Vegetative 194 8 6 40 − 0.0766 0.1992 0.07 0.03
Reproductive 224 8a 7 40 − 0.0259 0.0537 0.23 0.01
Reproductive 234 8a 7 40 − 0.0477 0.0803 0.25 0.01
Mean 11 5 40 0.3239 0.3155 0.43 0.03
Wheat Vegetative 94 11 5 40 0.1135 0.1337 0.42 0.04
Vegetative 114 4 2 40 − 0.2342 0.1681 0.65 0.05
Reproductive 144 8a 5 40 0.3897 0.2298 0.74 0.06
Maturity 174 5 2 40 0.0912 0.2971 0.50 0.02
Mean 6 5 40 0.1859 0.2142 0.58 0.05

2.5.3. Random forest (RF)
RF regression models (Breiman, 2001) are widely used to analyze
hyperspectral data because of its insusceptibility to outliers, non-
linearity, serial autocorrelation, and high dimensionality (Wójtowicz
et al., 2021). RF is a non-parametric machine learning algorithm that
consists of an ensemble of unpruned decision trees. These decision trees
are trained on samples randomly selected through replacement. Roughly
two-thirds of the samples are used for training. The remaining out-of-
bag (OOB) samples are used for error assessment. Each tree consists of
a subset of the available predictors defined by the “mtry” parameter. In
our study, we set mtry to p/3 (where p is the number of predictors). One
hundred ensembles consisting of 1000 decision trees were generated for
each predictive model to increase the robustness of the predictions and
reduce the risk of over-fitting (Belgiu and Drăguţ, 2016). We present the
results of average predictions across all iterations.
We used recursive feature elimination (RFE) (Guyon et al., 2002) to
remove redundant predictors. RFE is a wrapper feature selection method
that relies on the internal capability of RF to estimate the predictors’
importance. RF takes advantage of the OOB samples for this purpose.
Thus, in the first step, the Mean Squared Error (MSE) for each decision
tree is computed using OOB samples. In the next step, each predictor’s
values are permuted and the MSE is calculated again. In the end, the
mean error difference before and after permutation is calculated over all
decision trees. RFE applies a 10-fold cross-validation strategy to itera­
tively discard the least important predictors.
We developed models for each crop based on single date and multi-
date (i.e., seasonal) images using ≤ 5 predictors as determined through
RFE. This conforms to Thenkabail et al. (2000) who suggested the ratio
of predictors to number of samples should be between 0.1 and 0.2. The
predictors were first-derivative transformed to increase the signal-to-
noise ratio given the small number of predictors (Tsai and Philpot,
1998).
2.6. Field-level biomass and yield assessment
We assessed the performance of TBVIs, PLSR, and RF using the co­
efficient of determination (R2) and root mean square error (RMSE).
These metrics were calculated with 10-fold cross-validation because the
sample size of the biomass and yield data was small. R2 and RMSE were
generated from linear models driven by the top-performing TBVI in each
λ-λ plot because of the large number of TBVIs. Cross-validation was
performed over several iterations for PLSR and RF since errors can vary
substantially based on the seed conditions and feature ranking.

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Fig. 8. Lambda-lambda plots highlighting regions of high and low correlations between Sentinel-2 TBVIs and biomass for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat
(d) during the top-performing growth phase.
3. Results
3.1. Field data summary
The biomass and yield samples were generally skewed, but contained
few outliers (Fig. 5). Corn on average produced more biomass and yield
than the other crops, followed by rice, wheat, and soybean. Yield on
average accounted for nearly half (41–45%) of the end-of-season
biomass. The interquartile range of biomass and yield between crops
with the exception of soybean were similar. Biomass distributions
however had larger interquartile ranges and were more skewed than
yield.
3.2. Estimation of biomass and yield with PRISMA and Sentinel-2 using
TBVs
The top-performing PRISMA TBVIs on average accounted for
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32–57% of the variability in biomass (Table 2). The average RMSE was
0.02 kg m− 2. The relationships were strongest for wheat and weakest for
soybean. The majority of TBVIs included narrowbands from the short­
wave infrared-1 (SWIR-1: 1000–1700 nm), followed by the NIR
(730–1000 nm), visible (400–730 nm) and shortwave infrared-2 (SWIR-
2: 1700–2500 nm), and red-edge (680–730 nm). The performance of the
models was highest for the vegetative phase for corn, reproductive phase
for soybean and wheat, and seasonal mean for rice. The corn TBVIs were
concentrated in a narrow region of the NIR at 739 nm (Fig. 6a). The rice
TBVIs were centered on a narrow region shifted to longer wavelengths in
the NIR at 918 nm (Fig. 6b). The soybean TBVIs clustered around the
NIR at 850 nm and SWIR-2 at 2300 nm (Fig. 6c). The performance of
wheat TBVIs was generally high across the available narrowbands
(Fig. 6d). Particularly strong correlations were centered on a narrow
region at 708 nm.
The PRISMA TBVIs tended to perform better for yield estimation
(33–62% of the variability). The average RMSE for yield was similar to
M. Marshall et al.
Fig. 9. Lambda-lambda plots highlighting regions of high and low correlations between Sentinel-2 TBVIs and yield for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat (d)
during the top-performing growth phase.
biomass (0.02 kg m− 2). The relationships were strongest for soybean,
followed by wheat, corn, and rice. The highest correlations were ach­
ieved for corn, rice, and wheat during the vegetative and reproductive
phases. Soybean yield was best estimated with a seasonal mean TBVI.
The TBVIs mainly consisted of visible and NIR narrowbands. SWIR-1,
SWIR-2, and red-edge narrowbands were less abundant. As with corn
biomass, the top-performing TBVIs included a narrow region in the NIR
centered at 729 nm (Table 7a). The rice TBVIs were centered on two
narrow regions of the visible and NIR centered at 679 nm and 908 nm
(Fig. 7b). A second region of high correlations occurred in the SWIR-2
around 2000 nm. The soybean TBVIs clustered in the visible and
SWIR-2 (Fig. 7c). As with wheat biomass, TBVIs for wheat yield corre­
lated well across the available narrowbands (Fig. 7d). The highest cor­
relations however were shifted to longer wavelengths in the SWIR-1
(around 1500 nm).
Sentinel-2 TBVIs on average explained 21–67% of the variability in
biomass (Table 3). The average RMSE was 0.03 kg m− 2. The Sentinel-2
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
TBVIs tended to perform better for corn (ΔR2 = 0.05) and wheat (ΔR2 =
0.10) than the PRISMA TBVIs. PRISMA TBVIs performed better for rice
(ΔR2 = 0.34) and soybean (ΔR2 = 0.07). The bulk of the Sentinel-2
TBVIs for biomass included the red-edge, followed by the visible and
NIR, and SWIR. The strongest correlations occurred during the vegeta­
tive phase for corn and rice, the seasonal mean for soybean, and the
reproductive phase for wheat. The highest performing TBVIs for corn
consisted of band 6 and band 8 (Fig. 8a). The various combinations of
Sentinel-2 bands were weakly correlated with rice biomass (Fig. 8b).
Band 11 was the most abundant in the top-performing TBVIs. Similarly,
soybean TBVIs tended to perform poorly across Sentinel-2 bands
(Fig. 8c). Like PRISMA, several Sentinel-2 bands performed well for
wheat biomass (Fig. 8d). The red-edge (band 6, 7) and NIR produced the
highest correlations.
The performance of Sentinel-2 TBVIs was generally lower for yield
estimation (16–58% of the variability). Like biomass, Sentinel TBVIs
performed better for corn (ΔR2 = 0.07) and wheat (ΔR2 = 0.11) and
M. Marshall et al. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

Table 4
Summary of the PLSR decomposition of PRISMA spectral data at a given day of year (DOY) of image acquisition. The percentage of total explained variance is shown for
each component alongside model performance.
Crop Growth Phase DOY N R2 RMSE Comp.1 Comp.2 Comp.3 Comp.4 Comp.5

Biomass
Corn Vegetative 143 39 0.55 0.58 22.78 71.78
Vegetative 177 40 0.42 0.62 74.78
Reproductive 212 37 0.47 0.67 50.92 18.08 15.83 2.06
Mean Mean 40 0.48 0.65 47.62 44.11 1.38 1.14
Rice Vegetative 177 40 0.51 0.65 75.66
Vegetative 212 37 0.45 0.67 19.76 62.55
Maturity 259 39 0.58 0.59 31.49 39.48 12.04 8.60
Mean Mean 40 0.56 0.61 62.84 28.39 4.14
Soybean Vegetative 177 26 0.24 0.14 69.16
Reproductive 212 26 0.23 0.14 71.22
Mean Mean 26 0.24 0.13 71.26
Wheat Vegetative 97 38 0.57 0.59 75.92 14.81
Reproductive 143 39 0.67 0.47 68.06 22.51 2.45 1.05 0.74
Maturity 177 38 0.70 0.52 71.60 7.40 12.47
Mean Mean 39 0.62 0.50 50.46 41.03
Yield
Corn Vegetative 143 39 0.46 0.27 56.41 38.15
Vegetative 177 40 0.48 0.25 74.52 16.38
Reproductive 212 37 0.50 0.28 52.92 18.01 14.02 1.59
Mean Mean 40 0.43 0.28 42.43 49.36
Rice Vegetative 177 40 0.39 0.26 75.06
Vegetative 212 37 0.38 0.26 41.84 38.88
Maturity 259 39 0.56 0.22 37.08 38.39 8.00
Mean Mean 40 0.38 0.25 62.60
Soybean Vegetative 177 26 0.49 0.06 52.07 44.83 0.46 0.92 0.60
Reproductive 212 26 0.47 0.07 67.94 24.71
Mean Mean 26 0.38 0.07 57.13 38.88
Wheat Vegetative 97 38 0.49 0.25 76.17 8.58
Reproductive 143 39 0.62 0.19 67.96 22.63 2.40 1.12 1.17
Maturity 177 38 0.66 0.21 71.15 11.38 9.18
Mean Mean 39 0.55 0.21 52.82 38.51

worse for rice (ΔR2 = -0.17) and soybean (ΔR2 = -0.19) than PRISMA
TBVIs. Most top-performing Sentinel-2 TBVIs included bands in the red-
edge, followed by the NIR, visible, SWIR-1, and SWIR-2. Band 11
together with bands 3 and 5, produced the strongest correlations with
corn yield (Fig. 9a). Band 11 stood out for rice and soybean as well, but
the correlations were considerably lower (Fig. 9b-c). Sentinel-2 bands
correlated well for most combinations. The highest correlations were
occurred in the NIR (Fig. 9d).
3.3. Estimation of biomass and yield with PRISMA and Sentinel-2 using
PLSR
The PLSR models explained 23–70% of the variability in biomass
(Table 4). The mean RMSE was 0.50 kg m− 2. The explanatory power of
the models was comparable to the TBVIs, but the errors were much
higher. As with the TBVIs, the PLSR models performed best for wheat
and worst for soybean. The first component of the PLSR models tended
to explain the most variability (20–76%) in biomass. The reproductive
and maturity phases included more components reflecting the
complexity of spectra in these phases. The narrowbands in the PLSR
models consistently showed strong positive loadings in the NIR and
SWIR-1 during the vegetative phases (Fig. A1.2). The loadings in the
visible were positive in the early vegetative phase when the canopies
were not completely closed. The loadings became negative later in the
vegetative phase when the canopies were completely closed. Loadings in
the SWIR-2 were low. A similar pattern to the spectral response in the
advanced vegetative phase was seen during the reproductive phase, but
the loadings were typically lower. During the maturity phase when
canopies lose most of their chlorophyll, loadings became consistently
positive across the spectral range.
The PLSR models explained 38–66% of the variability in yield
(Table 4). The mean RMSE was 0.21 kg m− 2, which was quite a bit
higher than TBVI RMSE. Contrary to the TBVIs, model performance
tended to be lower for yield than biomass. Performance was highest for
wheat, followed by corn, soybean, and rice. The first component of the
PLSR models generally explained more variability (37–76%) in yield
than the other components. The loadings for yield were similar to
biomass for corn, soybean, and wheat (Fig. A1.3). Rice showed a clear
muted response in the NIR and SWIR during all growth phases.
The PLSR models for Sentinel-2 explained 15–78% and 19–73% of
the variability in biomass and yield, respectively (Table 5). The average
RMSE was 0.50 and 0.44 kg m− 2. As with the PLSR models for PRISMA,
performance was lower for yield than biomass estimation. It was also
highest for wheat, followed by corn, soybean, and rice. Performance was
consistently better in the earlier phases of crop development. The first
component of the Sentinel-2 models tended to explain more variability
(upwards of 90%) than the PRISMA models. The Sentinel-2 models
(except for soybean) performed poorer than the PRISMA models. The
PRISMA models greatly out-performed the Sentinel-2 models for rice
(ΔR2 = 0.27). The performance was comparable for the two sensors for
yield estimation. The ΔR2 for rice was lower (0.18).
3.4. Prediction of biomass and yield with Random forest (RF)
The RF-based PRISMA models generally explained more variability
in biomass and yield (10% and 7%) with considerably fewer (≤5) nar­
rowbands than PLSR (Table 6). The best performing models for biomass
were obtained when all PRISMA images were used as input predictors:
corn (R2 = 0.64 and RMSE = 0.50 kg m− 2), rice (R2 = 0.74 and RMSE =
0.47 kg m− 2), soybean (R2 = 0.81 and RMSE = 0.09 kg m− 2), and wheat
(R2 = 0.82 and RMSE = 0.36 kg m− 2). The best yield predictions were
obtained using all PRISMA data for rice (R2 = 0.63 and RMSE = 0.20 kg
m− 2), soybean (R2 = 0.86 and RMSE = 0.04 kg m− 2), and wheat (R2 =
0.80 and RMSE = 0.15).
When single-date images were used as predictors, the best prediction
for the corn biomass was obtained at the early vegetative stage.

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Table 5
Summary of the PLSR decomposition of Sentinel-2 spectral data at a given day of year (DOY) of image acquisition. The percentage of total explained variance is shown
for each component alongside model performance.
Crop Growth Phase DOY N R2 RMSE Comp.1 Comp.2 Comp.3 Comp.4 Comp.5

Biomass
Corn Vegetative 114 40 0.29 0.67 90.03 NA NA NA NA
Vegetative 144 40 0.57 0.51 63.51 34.95 NA NA NA
Vegetative 174 40 0.55 0.53 81.71 15.80 1.39 0.83 NA
Vegetative 194 40 0.41 0.61 54.72 16.23 26.66 NA NA
Reproductive 224 40 0.30 0.66 46.96 18.20 32.46 NA NA
Reproductive 234 40 0.36 0.63 49.75 11.54 36.56 NA NA
Mean 40 0.43 0.60 44.35 47.13 6.64 1.39 NA
Rice Vegetative 174 40 0.36 0.68 48.16 20.10 31.24 0.36 0.06
Vegetative 194 40 0.15 0.79 37.85 58.77 NA NA NA
Vegetative 224 40 0.19 0.77 16.05 70.53 NA NA NA
Reproductive 234 40 0.34 0.70 62.03 30.52 2.63 3.22 1.43
Mean 40 0.22 0.76 35.06 26.28 NA NA NA
Soybean Vegetative 174 26 0.44 0.11 59.51 40.12 0.23 NA NA
Vegetative 194 26 0.23 0.13 85.97 NA NA NA NA
Reproductive 224 26 0.25 0.14 29.75 NA NA NA NA
Reproductive 234 26 0.28 0.12 80.42 NA NA NA NA
Mean 26 0.39 0.12 59.80 37.22 0.40 2.41 NA
Wheat Vegetative 94 40 0.53 0.56 75.85 21.34 1.86 NA NA
Vegetative 114 40 0.64 0.48 65.64 NA NA NA NA
Reproductive 144 40 0.78 0.37 67.26 30.51 1.20 NA NA
Maturity 174 40 0.60 0.52 85.83 5.09 7.84 0.93 NA
Mean 40 0.65 0.46 61.26 NA NA NA NA
Yield
Corn Vegetative 114 40 0.37 0.26 90.20 NA NA NA NA
Vegetative 144 40 0.41 0.25 78.20 20.26 0.89 0.43 0.13
Vegetative 174 40 0.61 0.20 81.70 15.54 1.74 0.73 0.12
Vegetative 194 40 0.56 0.22 52.53 24.59 20.34 1.51 NA
Reproductive 224 40 0.44 0.24 47.16 15.47 35.27 NA NA
Reproductive 234 40 0.54 0.22 49.30 16.05 32.54 NA NA
Mean 40 0.53 0.22 42.99 42.68 12.26 1.58 NA
Rice Vegetative 174 40 0.23 0.27 53.41 41.23 2.95 2.28 0.05
Vegetative 194 40 0.19 0.28 60.62 33.95 3.44 1.16 NA
Vegetative 224 40 0.27 0.26 50.18 46.39 1.62 0.71 NA
Reproductive 234 40 0.33 0.24 20.19 72.97 NA NA NA
Mean 40 0.23 0.27 46.94 46.74 3.14 2.38 0.63
Soybean Vegetative 174 26 0.46 0.06 51.71 47.95 0.16 0.10 NA
Vegetative 194 26 0.27 0.07 85.34 NA NA NA NA
Reproductive 224 26 0.45 0.06 68.35 22.10 7.90 NA NA
Reproductive 234 26 0.39 0.07 79.90 NA NA NA NA
Mean 26 0.48 0.06 67.90 28.87 2.83 NA NA
Wheat Vegetative 94 40 0.43 0.24 75.64 21.90 1.26 0.90 NA
Vegetative 114 40 0.56 0.20 65.50 31.85 1.09 0.29 NA
Reproductive 144 40 0.73 0.15 67.42 NA NA NA NA
Maturity 174 40 0.58 0.20 85.79 7.25 5.72 0.90 0.23
Mean 40 0.55 0.20 61.01 NA NA NA NA

Narrowbands with RF were able to reasonably predict rice and soybean
biomass at the early vegetative stages as well. Contrary to corn, rice and
soybean, what biomass was best predicted with PRISMA images
collected at reproductive and maturity stages. PRISMA images collected
at the reproductive stage obtained the best prediction for all crops with
the exception of rice, which was best predicted at the vegetative stage.
There was much variation in the most important predictors among the
RF models, but some important patterns emerged. Narrowbands in the
NIR and SWIR were more important than in the visible or red-edge
across crops and growth stages. Narrowbands in the NIR and SWIR1
(SWIR1 and SWIR2) were important for predicting yield (biomass) at the
maturity phase. Narrowbands in the SWIR1 were also important for
predicting biomass at the reproductive stage. SWIR2 was more impor­
tant at the vegetative stage for biomass. The most important predictors
mostly linked to regions of the spectrum with the highest positive and
negative loadings, but this was not always the case. For example, rice
biomass exhibited strong negative loadings in the visible at the vege­
tative stage, which did not appear in the final RF model.
Sentinel-2 broadbands and red-edge narrowbands on average
explained 6% less variability in end-of-season biomass with higher error
(ΔRMSE = 0.05 kg m− 2) (Table 7).
The best prediction for corn yield was obtained with Sentinel-2
images (R2 = 0.72 and RMSE = 0.17 kg m− 2). As with PRISMA, pre­
dictions were highest early in the season when single-date Sentinel-2
images were used. Sentinel-2 performed particularly well for wheat
biomass and yield when all images collected along the entire growing
season were used as predictors. Sentinel-2 red-edge band 5 and NIR band
8 were the most important explanatory variables across crops and
growth stages. Contrary to PRISMA, the Sentinel-2 SWIR bands were
generally less important.
4. Discussion
4.1. Potential of PRISMA and Sentinel-2 images for yield and biomass
predictions
Our study revealed that both PRISMA and Sentinel-2 spectral data
can accurately predict the biomass and yield of corn, soybean, rice and
wheat.
This conclusion confirmed the results reported in the previous
studies assessing the potential of hyperspectral and multispectral mis­
sions (Mariotto et al, 2013, Marshall and Thenkabail, 2015a), UAV-
based red–green-blue and hyperspectral imaging (Li et al., 2020),
Sentinel-2 (Hunt et al., 2019) for yield and biomass predictions of

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Table 6
Summary of Random Forest predictive models at a given day of year (DOY) PRISMA acquisition. The predictors are expressed as wavelengths from left to right in order
of importance.
Wavelength (nm)

Crop DOY Stage N R2 RMSE 1 2 3 4 5

Biomass
Corn 143 Vegetative1 39 0.63 0.52 729 739 2127 1099 708
177 Vegetative 40 0.60 0.52 770 492 538 2143 759
212 Reproductive 37 0.54 0.57 650 641 538 530 1501
All 37 0.64 0.50 143–729 212–650 143–739 177–770 143–708
Rice 177 Vegetative1 40 0.64 0.54 2086 1131 854 1141 1028
212 Vegetative 37 0.66 0.51 770 2143 780 739 2175
259 Maturity 39 0.66 0.52 587 1120 579 2035 2027
All 37 0.74 0.47 259–1120 259–1240 259–1273 259–2035 259–579
Soybean 177 Vegetative 26 0.81 0.09 507 1480
212 Reproductive 26 0.79 0.09 833 1306
All 26 0.81 0.09 177–506 212–833 212–2320 212–1306
Wheat 97 Vegetative 38 0.59 0.58 708 587 570 562
143 Reproductive 39 0.74 0.41 470 1141 1131 538 1008
177 Maturity 38 0.74 0.48 2229 660 822 2222 1606
All 38 0.82 0.36 143–470 143–1141 177–2229 143–1131 177–660
Yield
Corn 143 Vegetative1 39 0.52 0.25 1784 1765 708 729 1295
177 Vegetative 40 0.52 0.24 770 780 759 2143 2414
212 Reproductive 37 0.63 0.21 538 650 641
All 37 0.71 0.19 143–1784 212–538 143–1765 177–770 212–729
Rice 177 Vegetative1 40 0.57 0.21 854 669 641
212 Vegetative 37 0.55 0.21 1078 1163 876 570 2206
259 Maturity 39 0.51 0.23 759 1109 1037 1284 1273
All 37 0.63 0.20 259–1120 259–759 259–579 259–1037 259–1273
Soybean 177 Vegetative 26 0.75 0.06 530 2283 2290 978 522
212 Reproductive 26 0.86 0.04 1616 739 886 1606 1595
All 26 0.86 0.04 212–1616 212–739 212–1606 177–530 212–886
Wheat 97 Vegetative 38 0.48 0.23 1993 2462 2496 587 554
143 Reproductive 39 0.71 0.17 1131 470 1141 1295 1008
177 Maturity 38 0.69 0.19 812 801 822 770 1606
All 38 0.80 0.15 177–812 177–822 177–801 143–470 143–1131
1
Early vegetative stage.

various crops. Mariotto et al. (2013) used stepwise regression to build
models between Hyperion hyperspectral narrowbands and wet- and dry-
weight biomass and yield on a smaller sample size of field data (8 and 23
samples respectively). Higher accuracies in that study were produced
(wet-weight corn biomass R2 = 0.99 and dry-weight yield for wheat R2
= 0.98) with four and eight predictors, respectively. In our work, we
reduced the number of input predictors to five for 40 samples following
the recommendation of Thenkabail et al. (2000) to prevent over-fitting.
Marshall and Thenkabail, (2015a) analyzed more samples and used
fewer predictors with stepwise regression. Their model outperformed
ours for rice (N = 20, R2 = 0.92) and corn (N = 20, R2 = 0.93) biomass
using only two predictors. Wet-weight biomass samples were collected
throughout the growing season, especially during the vegetative and
reproductive stages. Their models therefore captured more variability
and were more sensitive to environmental stressors that may otherwise
be obscured in end-of-season biomass. Like our study, spectra were first-
derivative transformed.
Hunt et al. (2019) evaluated the performance of Sentinel-2 broad­
bands and red-edge and NIR narrowbands for predicting wheat yields.
Yield data were collected from combined harvesters. This resulted in a
large sample size (N = 8000). Peak performance using RF and normal­
ized two-band ratios occurred at the maturity stage, but the models
explained 15% less variability than our study. Better results were re­
ported by Li et al. (2020) for potato yield (R2 > 0.90) and biomass (R2 >
0.80) estimated with PLSR and RF models and UAV images.
who stated that, in general, yield is more difficult to predict than
biomass because of its sensitivity to G × E × M. In previous studies (Li
et al., 2020; Montesinos-López et al., 2017), prediction models devel­
oped using VIs obtained lower accuracy than PLSR models that account
for the full optical range. In our work PLSR, performed better than TBVI
except for soybean biomass and yield, wheat biomass and yield, and
corn yield prediction obtained using PRISMA images.
The RF-based models developed using PRISMA performed better
with lower error and considerably fewer predictors (≤5) than the TBVI
and PLSR models for both yield and biomass. These results confirmed
previous studies that showed that RF-based prediction models out­
performed other methods including PLSR (Li et al., 2020) or support
vector regression and artificial neural network (Wang et al., 2016). RF
performed better than the other two methods because it exploited the
explanatory power of first-derivative transformed PRISMA as predictors.
The first-derivative transformation adopted in our study was a way to
accentuate important wavelengths, while diminishing the importance of
adjacent narrowbands that explain essentially the same variance (i.e.,
eliminated redundant information). Further, RF accounted only for the
five (or less) most relevant features selected using RFE feature selection
method.
4.3. Importance of the multi-temporal images for yield and biomass
predictions

The best prediction results were obtained by RF when all available

4.2. Performance of TBVI, PLSR and RF-based prediction models
Our results showed that TBVI, PLSR, and RF-based prediction
models, with the exception of soybean and corn, performed better for
biomass than yield. A similar conclusion was drawn by Li et al (2020)
images were considered as input predictors. These results confirmed the
study of Hunt et al. (2019) who showed that incorporating multiple
acquisitions of remote sensing spectra over the growing season led to
considerably higher model performance.
Previous studies (e.g., Johnson, 2016) identified the highest

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Table 7
Summary of Random Forest predictive models at a given day of year (DOY) Sentinel-2 acquisition. The predictors are expressed as band numbers from left to right in
order of importance. N = 40 for corn, rice and wheat and N = 26 for soybean.
Band #

Crop Stage DOY R2 RMSE 1 2 3 4 5

Biomass
Corn Vegetative1 114 0.50 0.63 5 7
Vegetative1 144 0.55 0.60 7 6 8a 8 4
Vegetative 174 0.46 0.64 5 7 8a 8 3
Vegetative 194 0.51 0.60 3 6 5 8a 7
Reproductive 224 0.52 0.59 5 6 3 11 8
Reproductive 234 0.50 0.64 3 5 4 7 8
All 0.57 0.45 234–3 144–6 144–7 224–11 114–5
Rice Vegetative1 174 0.52 0.65 11 4 8a
Vegetative 194 0.44 0.72 12 4 11 7 5
Vegetative 224 0.45 0.71 8 12 8a 5 6
Reproductive 234 0.51 0.62 12 11 7 8a 8
All 0.47 0.69 174–11 174–12 234–8 234–7 174–4
Soybean Vegetative 174 0.69 0.13 5 3 7 6 8a
Vegetative 194 0.73 0.12 3 4
Reproductive 224 0.70 0.12 4 11 5 12 3
Reproductive 234 0.73 0.11 7 8
All 0.71 0.11 174–5 224–11 174–3 194–3 234–7
Wheat Vegetative 94 0.65 0.50 3 5 12 4 6
Vegetative 103 0.69 0.49 4 12 5 3 11
Reproductive 144 0.81 0.37 4 12 5
Maturity 174 0.55 0.60 5 8a 8 7 11
All 0.81 0.37 4 12 5
Yield
Corn Vegetative1 114 0.57 0.22 4 5
Vegetative1 144 0.39 0.29 7 8
Vegetative 174 0.42 0.27 5 8 8a 7 3
Vegetative 194 0.67 0.20 6 8a 3 7 8
Reproductive 224 0.62 0.22 5 3 4 6 8a
Reproductive 234 0.58 0.23 3 5 6 8a
All 0.72 0.17 234–3 224–5 224–3 194-8a 194–8
Rice Vegetative1 174 0.31 0.28 8a 4 8 7 5
Vegetative 194 0.40 0.26 12 11
Vegetative 224 0.48 0.24 4 8 7 8a 5
Reproductive 234 0.56 0.21 8 7 12 8a 5
All 0.46 0.22 234–7 234–8 234-8a 224–4 224–5
Soybean Vegetative 174 0.78 0.06 12 8 5 4
Vegetative 194 0.82 0.05 11 6 3 12
Reproductive 224 0.77 0.06 3 6 8 8a 11
Reproductive 234 0.76 0.06 6 8 8a 12 4
All 0.84 0.04 194–11 234–6 194–3 194–6 234–12
Wheat Vegetative 94 0.55 0.21 5 3 4 6 12
Vegetative 103 0.60 0.21 4 12 5 7 3
Reproductive 144 0.77 0.15 4 5 12 3 7
Maturity 174 0.59 0.22 12 11 7 6 5
All 0.77 0.15 144–4 144–12 144–5 144–3 144–7
1
Early vegetative stage.

correlation between yield and spectral indicators at the onset of the
reproductive stage (i.e., anthesis). This is the point in crop development
when the canopy reaches peak productivity and maximum chlorophyll
absorption. This phase is also the most complex because plants transi­
tion from the development of vegetative to reproductive organs (i.e., the
grain-filling process triggers translocation of assimilate from plant to
yield). Photosynthesis slows during the maturity phase, but chlorophyll
can still impact the spectral response. Longer wavelengths associated
with non-photosynthetic vegetation (NPV) crop components however,
as displayed by the high PLSR loadings in the SWIR1 and SWIR2,
become more prominent. We hypothesize this is due to the depletion of
canopy moisture during maturity. Absorption due to canopy moisture
tends to obscure the NPV absorption signal during earlier growth stages.
The NIR region, which during maturity is associated with scatter from
NPV canopy structure was more important for yield than biomass. The
yield is completely covered by a spikelet for rice and wheat during
maturity. Perhaps the spikelet scatters NIR without impacting absorp­
tion features of other plant material. A larger sample size, more so­
phisticated data mining techniques, and additional field data collected
through the growing season are required to test these hypotheses.
The strong performance of spectra at the early vegetative phase for
corn and rice for yield was surprising. Biomass accumulation is less
critical to grain-filling pre-anthesis than post-anthesis, but early crop
development does have an impact on end-of-season biomass and yield
(Kemanian et al., 2007). At the same time, corn and rice spectra at the
early vegetative stage when canopies are open, are significantly
impacted by soil and water background presence, respectively. Soils
tend to scatter more light with increasing wavelength from the visible to
NIR. Scatter from soil remains high, but is lower in the SWIR when soil is
moist. Rice fields are flooded or saturated, so the rice signal is impacted
more by water presence than by soil characteristics. Water, contrary to
soil, absorb most incoming radiation. Soil conditions (e.g., soil fertility)
at these early stages could improve predictions, but we suspect soil in
general suppresses the vegetation signal. In order to prove this, we
would need a spectral library consisting of crop, soil, and water end­
members to sperate the signal through unmixing.
The transition from the reproductive to maturity stage is best illus­
trated by rice and wheat spectra. Rice narrowbands were acquired at the
beginning of the maturity phase, while wheat narrowbands were ac­
quired at the end of the maturity phase. The rice signal showed a weaker

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but clear response to chlorophyll in this stage than at earlier stages
where background influence was still dominant. The wheat signal on the
other hand was devoid of the chlorophyll signal and instead resembled
soil spectra.
Soybean is faster growing than the other crops, so it was rotated out
earlier with more variable timing. Fourteen soybean samples had to be
discarded because their growth cycles did not correspond well to the
available image acquisition dates. The smaller size likely impacted
soybean model performance.
The PLSR loadings at the later vegetative, reproductive, and maturity
stages showed similar patterns in the visible, NIR, and SWIR across crop
types. Negative loadings in the visible during the vegetative and
reproductive phase are influenced mainly by chlorophyll in the visible
red and less so by absorption of chlorophyll and accessory pigments
outside the visible red. This absorption outweighs the influence of
scatter near the green peak. Negative loadings in the SWIR2 could be
due to absorption by water content in the canopy (main effect) and
proteins or carbon base constituents (secondary effect). The strong
positive loadings in the NIR and SWIR1 during the vegetative and
reproductive phase are affected mostly by scatter from canopy structure.
The results of our analysis confirm Mariotto et al. (2013) and
Marshall and Thenkabail, (2015a), which highlighted the importance of
NIR and SWIR over visible and red-edge narrowbands for predicting
crop biomass and yield. The SWIR region was more important for
biomass estimation and PRISMA outperformed Sentinel-2. Several
important features in the SWIR region are related to biomass accumu­
lation, which are indistinguishable by Sentinel-2 SWIR broadbands. On
the other hand, the NIR region was more important for yield estimation
and PRISMA slightly underperformed. PRISMA had large data anomalies
(e.g., spikes) in the NIR. The largest spike corresponded to lower PLSR
loadings near the red-edge inflection point (730 nm) and the first-
derivative transformation could have augmented it. We tested other
smoothing techniques but this did not impact the outcome of the anal­
ysis. The data spike issue in the standard PRISMA product is currently
being addressed by two of the co-authors. Sentinel-2 red-edge narrow­
bands at the vegetative and reproductive stages with their sensitivity to
chlorophyll content, clearly boost the predictive power of NIR broad­
bands. This led to better Sentinel-2 performance for yield estimation
when data from active vegetation were analyzed. Sentinel-2 performed
particularly well for wheat at the reproductive stage. Timing clearly
played an important role. Sentinel-2 data are available continuously,
whereas PRISMA is available on-demand. As a result, more Sentinel-2
images were acquired at each growth stage, which increased the likeli­
hood of capturing a biophysical property or biochemical process related
to biomass and yield.
4.4. Future work
The study showed the potential of hyperspectral imagery and ma­
chine learning techniques for crop yield estimation but future work
should address the limitations of such data and methods given the re­
quirements of agricultural monitoring systems.
The narrow swath (30 km) and temporal characteristics of PRISMA
are not ideal for operational monitoring. At-nadir acquisitions are
theoretically available over the same target every 29 days. PRISMA
imagery is currently available only on demand, which means off-nadir
acquisitions are frequently made. This hinders periodic and systematic
acquisition over the same target. Further, the spatial resolution of these
images makes it difficult to use them in smallholder farming systems.
One way of addressing these challenges is to combine PRISMA with
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ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210
other satellite images such as Sentinel-2 either via data fusion (Acito
et al., 2022) or integration.
Machine learning algorithms, in general, require a large number of
samples collected across large areas and several growing seasons. To
address the challenges related to sample availability, transfer learning
approaches similar to those recently used for Nitrogen estimation (Wan
et al., 2022) using hyperspectral measurements should be considered.
5. Conclusion
Within-season forecasting of agricultural production with space­
borne hyperspectral remote sensing remains in its infancy. We evaluated
the performance of narrowbands as detected by PRISMA spaceborne
platform against Sentinel-2 using end of season clear-cut dry-weight
crop biomass and yield samples acquired during the primary crop
growth phases (vegetative, reproductive, maturity). The assessment was
made for four global food crops (corn, rice, soybean, wheat) using TBVI,
PLSR, and RF methods. Our study showed that both PRISMA and
Sentinel-2 images are promising data sources for predicting crop yield
and biomass. RF obtained better prediction accuracy than TBVI and
PLSR for all crops with one exception. Corn biomass was similarly pre­
dicted with all three methods when Sentinel-2 images were used as input
predictors.
RF yielded the best prediction accuracy when multiple acquisitions
of remote sensing spectra over the growing season were used as input
predictors. The prediction phase also revealed the importance of
PRISMA NIR and SWIR and Sentinel-2 red-edge narrowbands in pre­
dicting crop biomass and yield. PRISMA slightly underperformed for
crop yield because of data anomalies in the NIR.
Future work should expand the sample size of our analysis, exam the
reliability of early season crop yield predictions based on mixed
vegetation-soil signals, and evaluate the performance of PRISMA/
Sentinel-2 data fusion/integration.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgments
Our research was supported by the European Space Agency (ESA) –
EO Science for society (EOEO-5 Block 4, 4000130277/20/I-DT) under
the projected titled, “HyNutri: Sensing ‘Hidden Hunger’ with Sentinel-2
and Hyperspectral (PRISMA)” (http://www.hynutri.nl). The authors
gratefully acknowledge the PRISCAV project (ASI Contract 2019-5-HH-
0) for the acquisition of PRISMA imagery and field spectral measure­
ments to assess data quality and pre-processing. We would like to extend
our gratitude to Dr. Donato Cillis and Gabriele Dottori of IBF-Servizi
who collected and processed the field samples. Finally, we would like
to thank Dr. Caroline Lievens and Kathrin Zweers from ITC’s Geoscience
Laboratory who coordinated the receipt, processing, and analysis of field
samples shipped by IBF-Servizi.
Appendix A
Annexes.
See Figs. A1.1-A1.3.
M. Marshall et al. ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing 187 (2022) 191–210

Fig. A1.1. Spectral signatures for wheat recorded in our study area during the early vegetative ( ), reproductive ( ), and maturity ( ) phases by (a) PRISMA
and (b) Sentinel-2. The black lines denote the average of all phases.

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Fig. A1.2. Relative contribution of PRISMA spectral features to biomass estimation for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat (d) at the three main growth stages:
early vegetative ( ), vegetative ( ), reproductive ( ), maturity ( ), and mean ( ).

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Fig. A1.3. Relative contribution of PRISMA spectral features to yield estimation for corn (a), rice (b), soybean (c), and wheat (d) at the three main growth stages:
early vegetative ( ), vegetative ( ), reproductive ( ), maturity ( ), and mean ( ).

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