Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition

This research addresses the challenge of medicinal plant species recognition based on leaf images by focusing on venation patterns as discriminative features. Venation patterns—defined by the hierarchical arrangement of veins within a leaf—carry significant taxonomic informatio...

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Main Authors: Arnav Sanjay Karnik, Nikhil Nair, Yashas Sagili, P. B. Pb
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: IEEE 2025-01-01
Series:IEEE Access
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Online Access:https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/11080426/
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author Arnav Sanjay Karnik
Nikhil Nair
Yashas Sagili
P. B. Pb
author_facet Arnav Sanjay Karnik
Nikhil Nair
Yashas Sagili
P. B. Pb
author_sort Arnav Sanjay Karnik
collection DOAJ
description This research addresses the challenge of medicinal plant species recognition based on leaf images by focusing on venation patterns as discriminative features. Venation patterns—defined by the hierarchical arrangement of veins within a leaf—carry significant taxonomic information that is often overlooked by conventional plant classification approaches. We propose a novel, venation-aware methodology that combines specialized image preprocessing techniques with both transfer learning and custom-designed deep learning architectures. Our method extracts and analyzes venation patterns at multiple spatial scales, capturing both global and fine-grained structural details to improve classification performance. To validate the effectiveness of our approach, we developed and evaluated three distinct model architectures: 1) a modified ResNet-50 model utilizing transfer learning with an adapted input pipeline for venation-aware channels; 2) a custom-built convolutional neural network, VenationNet, explicitly designed for multi-scale venation analysis; and 3) a Dual-Stream CNN architecture that processes leaf texture and venation maps independently before merging via attention-based fusion. Preprocessing involves contrast enhancement, Frangi filtering for venation extraction, and edge detection to create a three-channel input comprising RGB, venation, and edge maps. Experimental evaluation using the Indian Medicinal Plants Dataset demonstrates that our venation-centric strategy significantly outperforms traditional CNN-based approaches, achieving higher accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-scores across diverse plant categories. This research contributes a practical and scalable solution for reliable medicinal plant identification, which is crucial for pharmacological research, biodiversity monitoring, and traditional medicine practices. Moreover, our approach is well-suited for deployment in real-time mobile and edge computing environments.
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spelling doaj-art-b537c4eea55b43d4993b9062a422e7952025-08-20T02:48:16ZengIEEEIEEE Access2169-35362025-01-011312552612553610.1109/ACCESS.2025.358927811080426Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species RecognitionArnav Sanjay Karnik0https://orcid.org/0009-0007-0873-7735Nikhil Nair1https://orcid.org/0009-0006-9705-1673Yashas Sagili2https://orcid.org/0009-0003-1736-1769P. B. Pb3https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3276-7073Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal Institute of Technology, Udupi, Karnataka, IndiaDepartment of Computer Science and Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal Institute of Technology, Udupi, Karnataka, IndiaDepartment of Computer Science and Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal Institute of Technology, Udupi, Karnataka, IndiaDepartment of Computer Science and Engineering, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal Institute of Technology, Udupi, Karnataka, IndiaThis research addresses the challenge of medicinal plant species recognition based on leaf images by focusing on venation patterns as discriminative features. Venation patterns—defined by the hierarchical arrangement of veins within a leaf—carry significant taxonomic information that is often overlooked by conventional plant classification approaches. We propose a novel, venation-aware methodology that combines specialized image preprocessing techniques with both transfer learning and custom-designed deep learning architectures. Our method extracts and analyzes venation patterns at multiple spatial scales, capturing both global and fine-grained structural details to improve classification performance. To validate the effectiveness of our approach, we developed and evaluated three distinct model architectures: 1) a modified ResNet-50 model utilizing transfer learning with an adapted input pipeline for venation-aware channels; 2) a custom-built convolutional neural network, VenationNet, explicitly designed for multi-scale venation analysis; and 3) a Dual-Stream CNN architecture that processes leaf texture and venation maps independently before merging via attention-based fusion. Preprocessing involves contrast enhancement, Frangi filtering for venation extraction, and edge detection to create a three-channel input comprising RGB, venation, and edge maps. Experimental evaluation using the Indian Medicinal Plants Dataset demonstrates that our venation-centric strategy significantly outperforms traditional CNN-based approaches, achieving higher accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-scores across diverse plant categories. This research contributes a practical and scalable solution for reliable medicinal plant identification, which is crucial for pharmacological research, biodiversity monitoring, and traditional medicine practices. Moreover, our approach is well-suited for deployment in real-time mobile and edge computing environments.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/11080426/Convolutional neural networksdeep learningmedicinal plantsmulti-scale analysisplant recognitionvenation patterns
spellingShingle Arnav Sanjay Karnik
Nikhil Nair
Yashas Sagili
P. B. Pb
Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
IEEE Access
Convolutional neural networks
deep learning
medicinal plants
multi-scale analysis
plant recognition
venation patterns
title Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
title_full Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
title_fullStr Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
title_full_unstemmed Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
title_short Multi-Scale Venation Pattern Analysis for Medicinal Plant Species Recognition
title_sort multi scale venation pattern analysis for medicinal plant species recognition
topic Convolutional neural networks
deep learning
medicinal plants
multi-scale analysis
plant recognition
venation patterns
url https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/11080426/
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AT nikhilnair multiscalevenationpatternanalysisformedicinalplantspeciesrecognition
AT yashassagili multiscalevenationpatternanalysisformedicinalplantspeciesrecognition
AT pbpb multiscalevenationpatternanalysisformedicinalplantspeciesrecognition