DIFFRACTION PATTERNS AS A TOOL TO RECOGNIZE COPEPODS

Photographs of three species of calanoid copepods were digitized, bina rized and edited to remove the debris present in the images and to sim ulate different degrees of segmentation. Twenty-eight segmented images of the three species were generated after pre-processing to obtain th eir digital Fourier transform or diffraction pattern. Cluster analysis was carried out for the images of the copepods and for their diffract ion patterns to determine which set of images discriminated genus, spe cies and sex of the selected organisms. The dendrograms of the diffrac tion patterns had more power of discrimination and 50% less variabilit y. This method is promising, but more research is necessary in order t o implement an automated system for plankton identification in the nea r future.