A beverage dispenser includes a nozzle to dispense a beverage. The beverage dispenser further includes a camera to capture an image of the beverage as the beverage is dispensed from the nozzle. The camera has a field of view that includes the beverage. The beverage dispenser further includes a light source that illuminates the field of view of the camera. The beverage dispenser further includes a computer. The computer analyzes the image of the beverage and determines a characteristic of the beverage.

An assay apparatus includes a loading part in which a cartridge including a carrier having a spotting region and an assay region is loaded, an imaging unit that images the assay region, and a processor configured to perform a main determination, based on an assay region image, wherein the processor is configured to perform an abnormality determination for determining presence or absence of an abnormality in the assay region image, using, as a determination index, at least one of a difference between a relatively large pixel value and a relatively small pixel value in at least one column in the assay region image, a standard deviation based on the pixel values in each of the columns, or a variation coefficient based on the pixel values in each of the columns, and determine the processing content related to the main determination based on the presence or absence of the abnormality.

Methods, systems and devices for use in aerial or satellite-based applications to detect elements or magnitudes of interest, or monitor their changes, in a target location are disclosed. A transducing system includes a detector device to sense, transduce or detect optical properties of at least one transducing agent linked to the elements or magnitudes of interest. Based on the optical property of the transducing agent, the system generates information of the element or magnitude of interest. The methods and systems provide tools for detecting magnitudes from remote locations which are usually difficult or costly to measure on-site, thereby providing an efficient detection system for aerial detection systems.

An imaging target includes a light emitter configured to emit visible light from a surface of the imaging target, and an imaging device captures an image of at least the light emitter of the imaging target and acquires image data including the light emitter.

A vision inspection system includes a platform supporting parts for inspection at an inspection zone, an inspection station positioned adjacent the platform at the inspection zone including an imaging device to image the parts in a field of view above the upper surface, and a vision inspection controller receiving images from the imaging device. The vision inspection controller includes an auto focus module for orienting the imaging device relative to the inspection zone. The auto focus module determines a working distance for the imaging device from the inspection zone. The auto focus module calculates an image contrast score of pixel values of the images at various working distances from the inspection zone. The vision inspection controller causes the inspection station to operate the imaging device at an imaging working distance corresponding to the working distance associated with the highest image contrast score.

The invention relates to a method and device for orienting an umbilicated fruit, in which, during a first orientation phase (22), the presence of at least a portion of an umbilicus is detected in at least one initial image (II), then the fruit is driven (24) in spinning rotation about a first axis of rotation at an angular amplitude of between 5° and 45°, and then the presence of at least a portion of an umbilicus is detected in at least one subsequent image (IU). If at least a portion of an umbilicus is detected in at least one initial image (II) and no longer detected in each subsequent image (IU), the first orientation phase is stopped and the method is continued,

An information processing device includes a categorizing section configured to extract a material component image identified as a material component from plural images obtained by imaging a sample fluid containing a plurality of types of material components and flowing through a flow cell, and to categorize the extracted material component image by predetermined category, a count derivation section configured to derive a count of the material component per standard visual field, or derive a count per unit liquid volume of the material component contained in the sample fluid, for each of the categories based on the number of material component images categorized by the categorizing section, and a generation section configured to generate an all-component image in which the material component images are arranged according to the counts that have been derived by the count derivation section for each of the categories.

An optical inspection apparatus includes: a first filter having a plurality of passbands; a first beam splitter to reflect a first light that exits from the first filter to transfer the first light to an inspection target; a second beam splitter to split a second light, which is provided by reflecting the first light by the inspection target, into a first split light and a second split light; a second filter to receive the first split light, and having a passband different from the passbands of the first filter; a fluorescence microscope to generate a fluorescence image from a third light that exits from the second filter; and a first imaging module to generate a first image from the second split light.

A high-throughput optofluidic device for detecting fluorescent droplets is disclosed. The device uses time-domain encoded optofluidics to detect a high rate of droplets passing through parallel microfluidic channels. A light source modulated with a minimally correlating maximum length sequences is used to illuminate the droplets as they pass through the microfluidic device. By correlating the resulting signal with the expected pattern, each pattern formed by passing droplets can be resolved to identify individual droplets.

Disclosed are a material classification apparatus and method based on a multi-spectral NIR band. A material classification apparatus based on a multi-spectral NIR band includes: an input unit configured to acquire a multi-band NIR image of a target; an attention module configured to generate a spatio-spectral correlation map considering spatial information on the multi-band NIR image and a correlation between each band; and a classification model unit configured to analyze the spatio-spectral correlation map and output a material classification label for the target.