Contour-based image segmentation for on-line size distribution measurement of pneumatically conveyed particles

Pneumatic conveyance of particulate materials is an important technique widely used in many industries. This paper is concerned with image processing algorithms in an optical instrumentation system that is used to measure the size distribution of particles in a pneumatic suspension. A CCD camera is used to capture the images of the particulate flow field. - which is illuminated by a 650nm solid state laser. The size distribution of particles is then determined by processing the particle images through contour-based image processing algorithms including embedded pre-processing and particle detection. An artificial particle generator, for the first time, is implemented to generate comparative dataset. A relative comparison is made between the artificial dataset and real dataset obtained from power plant trials.