Investigating the Possibility of Estimation of Raw Cane Sugars Physicochemical Properties Using Crystal Morphological Features

Assessment of quality characteristics of agricultural and food products has been associated with many problems. The main purpose of this study was the evaluation of morphological characteristics of raw cane sugar crystals and then estimation of the raw cane sugars quality using digital image processing techniques. The quality properties of raw cane sugars such as ash content, sucrose content, invert sugar, color solution, pH, concentration of starch and dextran, moisture content and refractive index and also different morphological characteristics such as area means and medians of crystals, perimeter means and medians of crystals, quadrangle ness means and medians of crystals and count number of crystals were identified using digital image processing. The results demonstrated that there was a good correlation between morphological and some physicochemical properties of raw cane sugar such as ash, sucrose content, concentration of starch and dextran as well as refractive index using the obtained equations, some of the quality parameters can be estimated by their morphological characteristics.