The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jan. 27, 2004
Filed:
Aug. 09, 2000
Satoru Satake, Tokyo, JP;
Yukio Hosaka, Hiroshima, JP;
Hideharu Maruyama, Hiroshima, JP;
Nobuhiko Nakamura, Hiroshima, JP;
Satake Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
A method of diagnosing nutritious condition of crop in a plant field is disclosed. The method comprises the steps of: locating a camera equipped with a plurality of image elements in a predetermined central depression angle with respect to the plant field; obtaining an amount of reflection light of a crop leaf for each image element by image-taking the field; obtaining an image-taken area for each unit image element by an area function constituted by a conversion variable including a ground clearance, an image element depression angle, the number of image elements and a field angle of the camera; making an area compensation of the amount of reflection light for each image element by the image-taken area; making a depression angle compensation of the amount of reflection light by a depression angle coefficient predetermined for compensating differences of amounts of reflection light correspondingly with image element depression angles; measuring an amount of light incident on the crop leaf; obtaining reflectance from the amount of the reflection light compensated and the measured amount of incident light; obtaining first crop information in a predetermined area based on the reflectance and a first crop related formula predetermined for obtaining crop information from reflectance, and storing the first crop information; and determining a nutritious condition of the crop in the plant field based on the first crop information. Instead of the grand clearance of the camera, a distance of field of view of the camera may well be used.