Line-Scan Hyperspectral Imaging Platform for Agro-Food Safety and Quality Evaluation: System Enhancement and Characterization

Abstract

Line-scan-based hyperspectral imaging techniques have often served as a research tool to develop rapid multispectral methods based on only a few spectral bands for rapid online applications. With continuing technological advances and greater accessibility to and availability of optoelectronic imaging sensors and spectral imaging spectrographs, the range of implementation for hyperspectral imaging has been broadening across quality and safety inspection needs in the food and agricultural industries. We have developed a series of food inspection imaging systems based on hyperspectral line-scan imaging with the use of a low-light sensitive, electron-multiplying charge-coupled device (EMCCD). In this methodology article, the spectral and spatial system performance of the latest generation of the ARS hyperspectral imaging system, which is capable of reflectance and fluorescence measurements in the visible and near-infrared (NIR) spectral regions from 400 to 1000 nm, is evaluated. Results show that the spectral resolution of the system is 4.4 nm at full-width at half-maximum (FWHM) and 6 nm FWHM at our typical operation mode (6-pixel spectral binning). We enhanced the system throughput responses by using spectral weighting filters to better utilize the dynamic range of the analog-to-digital converter. With this system throughput adjustment, noise-equivalent reflectance measurements were significantly reduced by approximately 50% in the NIR region for a range of standard diffuse reflectance targets. The responsivity of the system from 450 to 950 nm was determined to be linear.