IDENTIFICATION AND SEPARATION OF MICROPROPAGATED SUGARCANE SHOOTS BASED ON THE HOUGH TRANSFORM

A Hough transform-based computer algorithm was developed to identify sugarcane shoots as straight lines in a micropropagated Stage 2 sugarcane shoot clump image. An arc-based shoot identification method developed previously was tested after changing the lighting from fluorescent to incandescent which improved contrast between stems and leaves. This method was then compared to the Hough transform method. The Hough transform algorithm correctly identified 93% of total shoots versus 82% for the arc method, missed 7% of the shoots versus 18% for the arc method, and improperly identified non-shoots as shoots 6% of the time versus 7% for the arc method.