TOMRA Food embarked on its first public demonstration of its new LUCAi deep learning technology for citrus fruits at Fruitnet Citrus Congress attendees in Valencia last week. Now available for lemons, mandarins, and oranges, the technology has demonstrated a >99% accuracy rate for difficult defects, including rot, sunburn, clipper cut, long stem, and doubles.
“For these particular defects, LUCAi outperforms even TOMRA’s well-received traditional mapping models,” said Dr. Christopher Johnston, Head of Applications Engineering at TOMRA Food. “The issue for traditional mapping of any type – whether TOMRA’s or a competitors’ — is that it focuses solely on a few pixels that show the suspected defect. This makes it harder to achieve accuracy with classification and grading in difficult defects, like clipper cut, because it doesn’t appreciate the wider context of the fruit.”
“LUCAi™ is already delivering a step-change in both performance and usability for other segments, with over 900 total lanes already sold for apples, cherries, and now citrus,” said David del Castillo, Regional Sales Director for Southern Europe. “I’m delighted to reaffirm TOMRA’s commitment to the citrus industry with the launch of this product.
LUCAi™ Citrus is the latest in a series of LUCAi™ deep learning applications
TOMRA Food’s sorters have long deployed AI processing tools. The vast majority of TOMRA machines currently operating use some form of AI, whether it’s machine learning or advanced deep learning. Initially launched for blueberries in 2018, LUCAi™ is now enabling even greater precision in detecting and grading citrus defects.
“We’ve already seen remarkable results for Spectrim with LUCAi™ in apples and cherries, and now we’re expanding to support lemon, mandarin, and orange applications,” said Dr. Christopher Johnston.
“Spectrim began with traditional algorithms to improve grading. Adding the shallow machine learning tools of SmartSkin and SmartMap brought additional improvements to Spectrim’s grading performance. Now, with LUCAi™ Deep Learning, Spectrim continues to improve. LUCAi™ has not only increased our accuracy on grading for the defects we already lead the industry; it is also allowing us to detect defects which were a challenge previously.”
LUCAi™ Citrus is being trialed in all citrus-growing regions in both hemispheres, including units already operational in Spain, the USA, and Australia, and additional installations underway in Italy and South Africa.
Delegate visit to Serifruit gives attendees an exclusive first look at LUCAi™ for citrus
As sponsors of the Fruitnet Citrus Congress in Valencia, TOMRA Food hosted a site visit to Serifruit in the heart of the “Plana Baja” area of Castellón. Serifruit is currently using LUCAi™ for citrus to drive performance improvements in its orange and clementine grading lines.
The delegation received a tour of the Serifruit packhouse and were among the first to see the live operation of the newly available LUCAi for Citrus application attached to the Spectrim optical grader and the TOMRA 5S Advanced electronic lane sorter.
Attendees were impressed with the ease of use of LUCAi™ and the set-up and easy maintenance of the TOMRA 5S Advanced.
Looking Ahead: TOMRA’s commitment to the citrus industry
“Citrus growers and packers need more efficient, precise and user-friendly sorting and classification systems and, with the wide variety of citrus fruits and the numerous varieties within each type, LUCAi™ Citrus is set to play a pivotal role and redefine the way they work,” said David del Castillo.
TOMRA Food’s Valencia headquarters, established in 2023, further supports its ongoing commitment to the citrus industry
