A novel 3D approach for the extraction of the wetting front in CT images of soil profiles

This paper describes a new automated method for the detection and volumetric reconstruction of the wetting front based on computerized tomography (CT) imaging of soil samples. The wetting front detection and its volumetric representation are important for analyzing the advancement of humidity in soils. However, there are few existing methods for the analysis of humidity contents and the detection of the wetting front in three-dimensions. This is a very challenging task due to factors such as the stochastic nature of the humidity infiltration process and of the structure of porous media (soils), as well as artifacts in the CT imaging of these materials. The inputs to our proposed method are the CT slices, and CT sequences showing the fluid infiltration process. Experimental results indicate that our method is efficient and may lead to new measurements of the fluid infiltration process in soils.