AN IMAGE-PROCESSING SYSTEM FOR TRACK-ETCH DETECTORS

An automated recognition system has been developed which identifies, c ounts and classifies nuclear tracks on solid state nuclear track detec tors (SSNTD). Special care is taken for overlapping tracks, allowing a nalysis of films with high track densities up to 60,000 tracks/cm(2). The performance of the proposed method, with a counting error of 3% fo r a track density of 30,000 tracks/cm(2), is superior to conventional track counting techniques when evaluating either CR-39 or Lexan SSNTDs . The recognition system evaluates each image in less than 2 s with a PC-486 at 66 MHz, allowing its integration in an on-line automated tra ck detection set-up.