Nondestructive inspection technology for plant steel structures using magneto-optical images using deep generative models

Measures against deterioration of infrastructures that were built during the high economic growth period are facing significant challenges with regard to the maintenance of infrastructures in Japan. The development of optimal nondestructive sensing and imaging technology according to the material and structure of buildings is underway to contribute to efficient and reliable maintenance of infrastructures. However, owing to the large number of materials and structures used for buildings, as well as the types of defects to be targeted, many basic studies are yet to reach the stage of practical use. In this study, we developed a magneto-optical (MO) sensor in order to visualize a “crack” in the plant steel structure and automatically detected the defects in the plant steel structure by performing deep learning on the MO image obtained. As a pretreatment for detecting anomalies in defects using the AI, we focused on the nondestructive inspection using MO imaging and performed an unprecedented image filter processing. As a result, automatically evaluation the several types of MO images using AI, the accuracy of defection identification was improved.