Examination of Image Processing Studies and Techniques in Food Sector: A Literature Review

In our global World, studies on food and food related-sectors, which are among the leading sectors, continue to gain momentum to increase productivity and quality. In parallel, the developments in the information technology motivate researchers to gain innovative approaches in these fields. Today, in the food sector as in many other areas, the classification of products, the detection of defective products, the detection of non-product parts are often solved using the human factor. However, many problems that can be solved using human visual sense can be solved more efficiently by means of a computer, which is known as the computer vision field. Computer vision offers automatic, harmless and low cost alternative techniques to verify that high quality and safety criteria are met in products. Today's image processing technology makes it possible, by reducing the human factor to the minimum, to increase the productivity and to reduce the cost. Moreover, some methods that cannot be used directly by human such as ultraviolet rays can be used by a computer to improve the product quality. In this study, some image processing applications used in the food sector are analyzed; the techniques used are examined.