It is November 2014 and you are a breeder at the end stage of seed selection. You are responsible for selecting varieties for commercial release (Table 1). You have data from the current testing year (2014) and variety performance data from previous years.
Goal of the Challenge: To develop a model that could be used to help scientists analyze large amounts of seed data more efficiently and effectively, leading to improvements in the world’s ability to grow more without using more resources.
Research Question: Which soybean varieties will perform better in farmers’ fields in 2015 & 2016?
In a 5- to 20-page scientific write-up, explain the following:
In order to help promote generalizable models, we plan to release training data for the Syngenta AI Challenge in stages. The following schedule will apply:
Participants will receive data describing all varieties that were tested in the 2014 class for the year 2012, along with the experimental yield data for those varieties, and geographic, soil and genetic characteristics.
Participants will receive data describing varieties of the 2014 class that cover all experimental trials for year 2013, indicating which of the Stage 1 varieties advanced to the following stage.
Participants will receive data describing varieties of the 2014 class that cover all experimental trials for year 2014, indicating which of the Stage 1 and Stage 2 varieties advanced to the final stage.