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X-ray CT in the detection of palm weevils

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Abstract

Early detection of the red palm weevils (RPW) is a major challenge in agriculture among all kinds of palm trees due to the nature of the insect and the difficulty to trace them through their life stages associated with the tree life. Many methods have been applied for the weevil detection such as X-ray diffraction techniques, fluoroscopy and ultrasound. On the other hand, the idea of tomography has been used for other purposes such as the determination of the age of the tree and for applied environmental studies. Such technology can also reveal the weevil in principle. In this study, we explore the use of X-ray CT for weevil detection with the Monte Carlo method. A model of the stem of a palm tree is developed for simulations. MCNPX is chosen to carry out the simulations for the radiography tally in the code. The tally records the 2D data of the X-ray beams irradiating the tree model. An iterative reconstruction method for cone beam CT is applied to obtain the 3D slices of the tree model. We are exploring the minimum number of projection angles and the detectability of the weevil. We shall also report the sensitivity of weevil detection using X-ray CT with a large set of simulations with different weevil sizes and tree diameters.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Radiological Sciences, College of Applied Medical Sciences, University of Dammam, Dammam, Saudi Arabia

    Andy K. W. Ma & Ali A. Alghamdi

  2. Agriculture Medical Solutions, Ltd., Hayes, Middlesex, UK

    Kassem Tofailli

  3. Centre of Nuclear and Radiation Physics, Faculty of Engineering and Physical Sciences, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK

    Nicholas M. Spyrou

Authors
  1. Andy K. W. Ma
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  2. Ali A. Alghamdi
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  3. Kassem Tofailli
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  4. Nicholas M. Spyrou
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Correspondence to Andy K. W. Ma.

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Ma, A.K.W., Alghamdi, A.A., Tofailli, K. et al. X-ray CT in the detection of palm weevils. J Radioanal Nucl Chem 291, 353–357 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-011-1202-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-011-1202-z

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