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Project

Industrial X-ray CT for high throughput quality control (iXCON).

Across the food and manufacturing sectors, internal product defects or features related to local density differences (breakdown of tissues in fruit, cracks, badly glued seals,...) are often next to impossible to detect by conventional inline ('at-conveyor-belt') sensor technologies. These technologies provide only a surface evaluation (e.g., camera systems), a partial volume analysis (e.g., near infrared), 2D images of the product interior (e.g., X-ray radiography) or the chance of detection depends strongly on the viewing angle. Volumetric (3D) imaging can resolve such features and locate them in the product in a non-destructive way by means of X-ray computed tomography (CT). However, while conventional CT systems allow full 3D analysis, they are (1) too slow, (2) too expensive or (3) not adapted to inline applications. Today, the lack of adequate volumetric quality control in the agricultural industry results in high rejection rates (between 5 and 10% in some sectors), mostly after destructive random sampling, resulting in entire batches being removed from the supply chain. Moreover, it is also important to stress that the lack of volumetric 3D data impedes the automation in this sector. Economic stakes are therefore high. With iXCon we plan to establish a break-through in high throughput industrial quality control of products in the agricultural processing and manufacturing industry. We aim to achieve this by designing a prototype X-ray imaging system suitable for high-throughput inline imaging with the ability to perform full 3D volumetric analysis. Integrated analysis methodology will combine X-ray and sensor data (i.e. optical, laser, thermal) with prior knowledge (i.e. statistical shape or CAD models) to allow for fast 3D quality control of a level that is until now unachievable by the state-of-the-art methods.
Date:1 Oct 2016 →  30 Sep 2018
Keywords:CT SCAN
Disciplines:Multimedia processing, Biological system engineering, Signal processing
Project type:Collaboration project