Extraction and interpretation of ring structures in images of biological hard tissues: application to fish age and growth estimation

Abstract

This paper presents a general framework for the automated estimation of age and growth from images of biological materials depicting concentric ring-like structures such as tree trunks, corals, bivalve seashells, fish scales or otoliths. This interpretation task can be seen as a ring segmentation issue, where growth rings are associated to image ridge and valley structures. This is stated as the Bayesian selection of a subset of partial ring curves extracted using a semi-local template-based growth-adapted scheme. The application to fish otolith interpretation provides a consistent and convincing validation of the proposed framework.

Age, growth and reproduction of the Morocco dentex Dentex maroccanus of the eastern coast of Algeria

“…Age was estimated by interpreting growth rings on 642 scales from 301 females (10.5 cm ≤ TL ≤ 26.7 cm, 16.05 g ≤ TW ≤ 278.45 g), 326 males (11.5 cm ≤ TL ≤ 26.1 cm, 22.73 g ≤ TW ≤ 300.80 g) and 15 immature individuals (10.4 ≤ TL ≤ 16.1 cm, 18.88 g ≤ TW ≤ 64.31 g). Scales were read using TNPC5 (Numerical treatment of calcified pieces) software (Fablet & Ogor, 2005). Readings were made by three independent investigations; the scales were used in subsequent analyses only when all three readings were in agreement.…”

Digital imaging techniques in otolith data capture, analysis and interpretation

“…Cefas = Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (UK), IMR = Institute of Marine Research (Norway), Difres = Danish Institute for Fisheries Research, Ifremer = Institut Français de Recherche pour l'Exploitation de la Mer (France), MRI = Marine Research Institute (Iceland), AZTI = AZTI Technology Centre (Spain), NS = North Sea, NEA = northeast Arctic, FP = Faroe Plateau, EC = Eastern Channel (ICES area VIId), Biscay = Bay of Biscay, Prep = otolith preparation, W = whole, S = section. Faroe samples collected by the Fish Ageing by Otolith Shape Analysis (FAbOSA) project (Arneri et al 2002) vision journals (Caselles et al 1998, Guillaud et al 2002a,b, Cao & Fablet 2006 and presented at conferences (Rodin et al 1996, Benzinou et al 1997, Fablet et al 2003, Fablet 2005, Chessel et al 2006. Most research into automated image-based CAAGE undertaken in the 2000s was funded by the European Union, and the emphasis probably reflected the broader information and communication technology (ICT) research and development (R&D) agenda that existed at that time in the EU.…”

“…The results from AFISA have been published in the form of an EU report only (Mahé 2009), although a subset of the work concerning Eastern Channel plaice feature widely in publications by Fablet and colleagues (Fablet 2005, 2006b, Fablet & Le Josse 2005. AFISA also analyse transect signals but employ a statistical framework and more complex pre-processing than do Robertson and colleagues (Morison et al 1998, Robertson & Morison 1999, 2001).…”