RFID technology for clonal selection purposes

Electronic barcodes based on radiofrequency identification (RFID) technology can be used in plant pathology to keep track of the sample identification. Moreover, phenotypic, environmental and genomical data could be added to RFID tags associated with the assayed plant. This aspect can be very useful for clonal selection in grapevine considering the long periods of time during which plants are monitored. RFID technology has been successfully used to identify plants during ampelographic, genetics and sanitary checks during the selection of grapevines in Montalcino (Italy), with no losses in retrieving information from plants. The electronic sheets created for registering results of clonal selection were successfully associated to each RFID-tagged plant and used for the preparation of the final dossier. The database in which sheets were stored was used for sharing information between researchers, allowing multiple access to data.