Pjd. Weeks et al., AUTOMATING THE IDENTIFICATION OF INSECTS - A NEW SOLUTION TO AN OLD PROBLEM, Bulletin of entomological research, 87(2), 1997, pp. 203-211
In this paper we describe a semi-automated digital image analysis syst
em which is capable of discriminating five closely related species of
Ichneumonidae. Specimens were distinguished by differences in their wi
ngs. The system functions by (a) extracting the significant variation
(principal components) among a training set of images of the same spec
ies, (b) using these principal components to efficiently represent the
morphology of wings of that species, and (c) exploiting the fact that
images of the same species will share characteristic principal compon
ents, while images of different species will not. Such an approach all
ows the construction of modular species classifiers, to which like spe
cies correlate strongly, while dissimilar species do not. A recognitio
n accuracy of 94% was achieved when the system was tested on 175 image
s of wings of the five ichneumonids. The wing images were caricatured
to accentuate their venation and pigmentation patterns.