Masahiko Suzaki

A horse identification system using biometrics

This paper introduces an application of iris recognition technology, using the iris pattern for horse identification. There are several problems to be solved in horse iris recognition: (1) It is very difficult for horses to remain motionless, which leads to mislocation and loss of focus during image acquisition, so that the images often have poor quality. (2) Pupil size varies significantly between the conditions of dilation (mydriasis) and contraction (miosis). (3) Horse iris patterns are not clear. As a solution for issue (1), we used the reflection of the illumination sources employed for image acquisition and chose adequate images suitable for recognition. For issues (2) and (3), we propose region extraction appropriate to the equine eye structure, a stable coordinate model for pupil variation, and recognition using orthogonal wrinkles in the iris pattern. Recognition experiments based on 100 sets of horse iris data show that highly accurate horse identification is possible.