Results and discussion
The adaptive segmentation algorithm was implemented on
the prototype X-ray scanner for fruit quarantine. The software
was initially tested extensively for X-ray images of various
kinds of fruits. For images of 512×512 pixels, the average
processing time was 270ms using a desktop computer with
2.4GHz Pentium IV CPU under the Microsoft XP Windows
environment. This processing speed is sufficient for nearly
real-time processing to mark the suspected infestation sites
in the X-ray image during fruit scanning in a quarantine operation.
In practice, the scanning operation requires that the
bands of scanned lines be continuously processed one after
another. Therefore, images of 80×960 pixels were acquired,
processed, and updated on the monitor sequentially to allow
for real-time inspection as the fruit wasmoved along the conveyor
belt. With the current algorithm, the scanning system