A machine vision system for identification of micro-crack in egg shell

Cracks or micro-cracks present in chicken egg shell are sources of bacterial contamination which has adverse effect to consumer's health. One egg system vacuum pressure chamber was fabricated to force open the micro-crack in egg shell and machine vision system was developed to acquire the image. Vacuum pressure of 18 kPa was applied to force open the crack. Two hundred chicken eggs ranging in color from white to brown, intact and cracked, dirty and clean were collected as samples. A robust algorithm was developed to extract the micro-crack from the image without being affected by the presence of dirt in the egg shell. The developed system was able to detect the micro-crack with 100% accuracy without being influenced by the presence of dirt in the egg shell. The developed system can be a milestone for developing egg sorting machines on the basis of presence-absence of crack in egg shell. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.