This paper makes a brief description of the definition and methods of data mining. It describes the characteristics of agricultural data (value delivery, specialization, spatio-temporal bidimensionality) and the status of application of data mining technology in agriculture.

In family studies with multiple continuous phenotypes, heritability can be conveniently evaluated through the so-called principal-component of heredity (PCH, for short; Ott and Rabinowitz in Hum Hered 49:106–111, <CitationRef CitationID="CR12">1999</CitationRef>). Estimation of the PCH, however, is notoriously difficult when entertaining...</citationref>