Abstract: An OCR system for matching wire harnesses and connectors facilitates precise registration of wire number strings, uses geometric modeling for character recognition, and restricts searches by region and character to ensure speed and accuracy. A string location algorithm is used to search for and identify the location of the beginning of a wire number string. The horizontal edges of the wire in the image are located, a diameter of the wire is determined, light intensity is confirmed, and the first character is found. The resulting coordinate is used by the algorithm for character definition. Geometric shapes are used for identification in order to overcome twisted wires, poorly printed markings, ink color variations, and contacting characters.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for inspecting heart valves. The method comprises projecting an actual image of a heart valve onto an image receiver, providing target data corresponding to a desired heart valve, comparing the actual image to the target data using a microprocessor, and determining whether the actual image matches the target data. The apparatus comprises a light source, a image receiver, a holder adapted to support a heart valve between said light source and the image receiver such that an actual image of the heart valve is received at the image receiver, a microprocessor in electronic communication with the image receiver. The microprocessor has access to target values for the regions of interest and compares the actual values in each region of interest to the target values to produce an output pass/fail signal.