Renfu Lu

Research Leader with the research unit of the United States Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service (USDA/ARS) at Michigan State University

Topic: Emerging Sensing Techniques for Nondestructive Quality Evaluation of Horticultural and Food Products.

Time: Nov. 10, 2017, 2:30pm

Place: the No.3 lecture hall on the third floor of the conference center.

Introduction to Dr. Renfu Lu

Dr. Renfu Lu is a Research Leader and Location Coordinator with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service (USDA/ARS), and he is also an adjunct professor with the Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering at Michigan State University. Dr. Lu manages and supervises the USDA/ARS research unit at MSU, which focuses on genetics, pathology and engineering for fruits, vegetables, dry beans and beets. He leads a research team on sensing and automation for quality evaluation and grading of horticultural products before, during and after harvest. His research has been documented in more than 260 publications, including 115 refereed journal articles, two books (edited) and 16 book chapters. Among many awards and recognitions Dr. Lu received are election of an ASABE Fellow (2013), Federal Laboratory Consortium Technology Transfer Award (2009), and Outstanding Alumni Award (2011) from the College of Agricultural Sciences, Pennsylvania State University. He served as an editor (2009-2015) for Transactions of the ASABE and Applied Engineering in Agriculture and chair of ASABE Publications Council (2016-2018) and Refereed Publications Committee (2014-2016).

Abstract:

Sensing technology plays a critical role in ensuring high quality, consistent, and safe food products, so as to meet the ever increasing consumer demand and also the regulatory requirements imposed by the governmental agencies. Optical techniques, in particular, have received much attention in research, because they have the potential of acquiring a large amount of useful information rapidly and also being cost effective and easier to implement for industrial applications. In recent years, our laboratory has developed several innovative optical techniques for property measurement and quality evaluation and grading of horticultural products. This presentation gives an overview of hyperspectral imaging-based techniques for quality evaluation of horticultural and food products; techniques for measuring optical properties of horticultural and food products; structured-illumination reflectance imaging technique for defect detection of horticultural products; and technology for apple harvest and automatic in-orchard sorting. Finally, an overall summary is given of these techniques in terms of their potential for practical applications and future research needs.

(School of Food and Biological Engineering)