Research on a Multi-Lens Multispectral Camera for Identifying Haploid Maize Seeds

Haploid breeding can shorten the breeding period of new maize varieties and is an important means to increase maize yield. In the breeding program, a large number of haploid seeds need to be screened, and this step is mainly achieved manually, which hinders the industrialization of haploid maize breeding. This article aims to develop a multispectral camera to identify the haploid seeds automatically. The camera was manufactured by replacing narrow-band filters of the ordinary CCD camera, and the RGB, 405 nm, 980 nm and 1050 nm images of haploid or diploid seeds were simultaneously captured (the characteristic wavelengths were determined according to color and high-oil markers of maize). The performance was tested using four maize varieties with the two genetic markers. The results show that the developed multispectral camera significantly improved the recognition accuracy of haploid maize seeds to 92.33%, 97.33%, 97% and 93.33% for the TYD1903, TYD1904, TYD1907 and TYD1908 varieties, respectively. The cameras in the near-infrared region (wavelengths of 980 nm and 1050 nm) achieved better performance for the varieties of high-oil marker, with an increase of 0.84% and 1.5%, respectively. These results demonstrate the strong potential of the multispectral imaging technology in the haploid seed identification of maize.