Detecting Sunburn in Pomegranates Using Machine Vision

Pomegranate is an important export product of Iran. From the consumer point of view, fruit appearance is an important quality factor for this fruit. That is why sorting fruits based on appearance has been focused by many researchers. One of the most important abnormalities in the appearance of the pomegranates is the effect of direct sun light on the ones which are directly exposed to it -known as “sunburn”. In this research a fully automatic sorting machine was designed and developed which separates the sunburn pomegranates from the other ones. The image processing part is based on color difference of different parts of the fruit skins. The entire sorting machine was fabricated and tested ensuring the effectiveness of the proposed design.