Yulong Zhou

Mr. Yulong Zhou

orcid

Research Focus & Metrics

Academic Career Length

3Years (2024-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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2 April 2025 in Sensors
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
ZLZongpu Li
Zongpu Li
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
TBTengFei Bao
TengFei Bao
Traditional crop classification methods have three critical limitations: (1) dependency on labor-intensive field surveys with limited spatial coverage, (2) susceptibility to human subjectivity during manual data collection, and (3) the inability to capture fine-grained spectral variations due to the lack of multispectral analysis. This research introduces an enhanced crop classification and identification model based on a residual ResNet network. This model leverages multispectral remote sensing images from unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to accurately classify complex crop planting structures. The research focuses on four typical crops: sunflower, corn, beet, and pepper. By acquiring and preprocessing multispectral remote sensing image data, an improved ResNet50 model integrating the ACmix self-attention module and a coordinate attention mechanism is developed to enhance the classification and recognition accuracy of these crops. Experimental results demonstrate that the improved model achieves a classification accuracy of 97.8% on multispectral images, outperforming both RGB images and traditional methods. This research highlights the potential of combining UAV multispectral remote sensing technology with deep learning for precise crop classification, offering valuable technical support for precision agriculture management.

16 September 2025 in Agronomy
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
SSSuning She
Suning She
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
This study conducted field experiments in 2024 in Meidaizhao Town, Tumed Right Banner, Baotou City, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, adopting a plant-level sampling design with 10 maize plots selected as sampling areas (20 plants per plot). At four critical growth stages—jointing, heading, filling, and maturity—multimodal data, including that covering leaf spectra, root-zone soil spectra, and leaf chlorophyll and nitrogen content, were synchronously collected from each plant. In response to the prevalent limitations of the existing yield prediction methods, such as insufficient accuracy and limited generalization ability due to reliance on single-modal data, this study takes the acquired multimodal maize data as the research object and innovatively proposes a multimodal fusion prediction network. First, to handle the heterogeneous nature of multimodal data, a parallel feature extraction architecture is designed, utilizing independent feature extraction branches—leaf spectral branch, soil spectral branch, and biochemical parameter branch—to preserve the distinct characteristics of each modality. Subsequently, a dual-path feature fusion method, enhanced by a cross-attention mechanism, is introduced to enable dynamic interaction and adaptive weight allocation between cross-modal features, specifically between leaf spectra–soil spectra and leaf spectra–biochemical parameters, thereby significantly improving maize yield prediction accuracy. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed model outperforms single-modal approaches by effectively leveraging complementary information from multimodal data, achieving an R2 of 0.951, an RMSE of 8.68, an RPD of 4.50, and an MAE of 5.28. Furthermore, the study reveals that deep fusion between soil spectra, leaf biochemical parameters, and leaf spectral data substantially enhances prediction accuracy. This work not only validates the effectiveness of multimodal data fusion in maize yield prediction but also provides valuable insights for accurate and non-destructive yield prediction.

19 March 2026 in Journal of Imaging
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
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YZYan Zhao
Yan Zhao
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
TBTengFei Bao
TengFei Bao
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
In recent years, deep learning has driven remarkable progress in remote sensing change detection (CD); however, practical deployment is still hindered by two limitations. First, CD results are easily degraded by imaging-induced uncertainties—mixed pixels and blurred boundaries, radiometric inconsistencies (e.g., shadows and seasonal illumination changes), and slight residual misregistration—leading to pseudo-changes and fragmented boundaries. Second, prevailing methods follow a static one-pass inference paradigm and lack an explicit feedback mechanism for adaptive error correction, which weakens generalization in complex or unseen scenes. To address these issues, we propose a feedback-driven CD framework that integrates a dual-branch U-Net with deep reinforcement learning (RL) for pixel-level probabilistic iterative refinement of an initial change probability map. The backbone produces a preliminary posterior estimate of change likelihood from multi-scale bi-temporal features, while a PPO-based RL agent formulates refinement as a Markov decision process. The agent leverages a state representation that fuses multi-scale features, prediction confidence/uncertainty, and spatial consistency cues (e.g., neighborhood coherence and edge responses) to apply multi-step corrective actions. From an imaging and interpretation perspective, the RL module can be viewed as a learnable, self-adaptive imaging optimization mechanism: for high-risk regions affected by blurred boundaries, radiometric inconsistencies, and local misalignment, the agent performs feedback-driven multi-step corrections to improve boundary fidelity and spatial coherence while suppressing pseudo-changes caused by shadows and illumination variations. Experiments on four datasets (CDD, SYSU-CD, PVCD, and BRIGHT) verify consistent improvements. Using SiamU-Net as an example, the proposed RL refinement increases mIoU by 3.07, 2.54, 6.13, and 3.1 points on CDD, SYSU-CD, PVCD, and BRIGHT, respectively, with similarly consistent gains observed when the same RL module is integrated into other representative CD backbones.

18 September 2024 in Preprints.org
Verified
Preprint
Open access
PDF file
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
TBTengFei Bao
TengFei Bao
TFTao Fang
Tao Fang
In the context of smart agriculture, accurately estimating plant leaf chemical parameters is crucial for optimizing crop management and improving agricultural yield. Hyperspectral imaging, with its ability to capture detailed spectral information across various wavelengths, has emerged as a powerful tool in this regard. However, the complex and high-dimensional nature of hyperspectral data poses significant challenges in extracting meaningful features for precise estimation. To address this challenge, this study proposes an end-to-end estimation network for multiple chemical parameters of Astragalus leaves based on attention mechanism (AM) and multivariate hyperspectral features (AM-MHENet). We leveraging HybridSN and multilayer perception (MLP) to extract prominent features from the hyperspectral data of Astragalus membranaceus var. mongholicus (AMM) leaves and stems, as well as the surface and deep soil surrounding AMM roots. This methodology allows us to capture the most significant characteristics present in these hyperspectral data with high precision. The AM is subsequently used to assign weights and integrate the hyperspectral features extracted from different parts of the AMM. The MLP is then employed to simultaneously estimate the chlorophyll content (CC) and nitrogen content (NC) of AMM leaves. Compared with estimation networks that utilize only hyperspectral data from AMM leaves as input, our proposed end-to-end AM-MHENet demonstrates superior estimation performance. Specifically, AM-MHENet achieves an R2 of 0.983 with an RMSE of 0.73 for the estimation of CC in AMM leaves. For NC estimation, AM-MHENet achieves an R2 value of 0.977 with an RMSE of 0.27. These results underscore AM-MHENet’s effectiveness in significantly enhancing the accuracy of both CC and NC estimation in AMM leaves. Moreover, these findings indirectly suggest a strong correlation between the development of AMM leaves and stems, as well as the surface and deep soil surrounding the roots of AMM, and directly highlight the ability of AM to effectively focus on the relevant spectral features within the hyperspectral data. This findings from this study could offer valuable insights into the simultaneous estimation of multiple chemical parameters in plants, thereby making a contribution to the existing body of research in this field.

22 October 2024 in Agriculture
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
TBTengFei Bao
TengFei Bao
TFTao Fang
Tao Fang
In the context of smart agriculture, accurately estimating plant leaf chemical parameters is crucial for optimizing crop management and improving agricultural yield. Hyperspectral imaging, with its ability to capture detailed spectral information across various wavelengths, has emerged as a powerful tool in this regard. However, the complex and high-dimensional nature of hyperspectral data poses significant challenges in extracting meaningful features for precise estimation. To address this challenge, this study proposes an end-to-end estimation network for multiple chemical parameters of Astragalus leaves based on attention mechanism (AM) and multivariate hyperspectral features (AM-MHENet). We leverage HybridSN and multilayer perceptron (MLP) to extract prominent features from the hyperspectral data of Astragalus membranaceus var. mongholicus (AMM) leaves and stems, as well as the surface and deep soil surrounding AMM roots. This methodology allows us to capture the most significant characteristics present in these hyperspectral data with high precision. The AM is subsequently used to assign weights and integrate the hyperspectral features extracted from different parts of the AMM. The MLP is then employed to simultaneously estimate the chlorophyll content (CC) and nitrogen content (NC) of AMM leaves. Compared with estimation networks that utilize only hyperspectral data from AMM leaves as input, our proposed end-to-end AM-MHENet demonstrates superior estimation performance. Specifically, AM-MHENet achieves an R2 of 0.983, an RMSE of 0.73, an MAE of 0.49, and an RPD of 7.63 for the estimation of CC in AMM leaves. For NC estimation, AM-MHENet achieves an R2 value of 0.977, an RMSE of 0.27, an MAE of 0.16, and an RPD of 6.62. These results underscore AM-MHENet’s effectiveness in significantly enhancing the accuracy of both CC and NC estimation in AMM leaves. Moreover, these findings indirectly suggest a strong correlation between the development of AMM leaves and stems, as well as the surface and deep soil surrounding the roots of AMM, and directly highlight the ability of AM to effectively focus on the relevant spectral features within the hyperspectral data. The findings from this study could offer valuable insights into the simultaneous estimation of multiple chemical parameters in plants, thereby making a contribution to the existing body of research in this field.

25 September 2025 in Agriculture
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
SSSuning She
Suning She
ZXZhiyun Xiao
Zhiyun Xiao
YZYulong Zhou
Yulong Zhou
The pharmacological quality of Astragalus membranaceus var. mongholicus (AMM) is determined by its bioactive compounds, and developing a rapid prediction method is essential for quality assessment. This study proposes a predictive model for AMM bioactive compounds using hyperspectral imaging (HSI) and wavelet domain multivariate features. The model employs techniques such as the first-order derivative (FD) algorithm and the continuum removal (CR) algorithm for initial feature extraction. Unlike existing models that primarily focus on a single-feature extraction algorithm, the proposed tree-structured feature extraction module based on discrete wavelet transform and one-dimensional convolutional neural network (1D-CNN) integrates FD and CR, enabling robust multivariate feature extraction. Subsequently, the multivariate feature cross-fusion module is introduced to implement multivariate feature interaction, facilitating mutual enhancement between high- and low-frequency features through hierarchical recombination. Additionally, a multi-objective prediction mechanism is proposed to simultaneously predict the contents of flavonoids, saponins, and polysaccharides in AMM, effectively leveraging the enhanced, recombined spectral features. During testing, the model achieved excellent predictive performance with R2 values of 0.981 for flavonoids, 0.992 for saponins, and 0.992 for polysaccharides. The corresponding RMSE values were 0.37, 0.04, and 0.86; RPD values reached 7.30, 10.97, and 11.16; while MAE values were 0.14, 0.02, and 0.38, respectively. These results demonstrate that integrating multivariate features extracted through diverse methods with 1D-CNN enables efficient prediction of AMM bioactive compounds using HSI.