23rd Telecommunications forum TELFOR 2015
Data mining model for early fruit diseases
detection
Milos Ilic, Petar Spalevic, Mladen Veinovic, Abdolkarim Abdala M. Ennaas
Abstract — Automatic methods for an early detection of
plant diseases could be vital for precise fruit protection.
Traditionally the agriculture expert’s knowledge is
descriptive and experiment based, therefore it is difficult to
describe it mathematically and subsequently build decision
system which can replace it. Key parameters of decision
based fruit protection system could differ for classes of plants
and diseases. However, such systems are very rare and very
complex, and in many cases designed just for one plant class.
For effective diseases protection of fruit, meteorological data
and data about the disease appearance are the most
important. In this paper authors propose one idea for data
mining based system for detection of possible fruit infection.
For this purpose, different types of data mining techniques
were evaluated on unique data sets.
Keywords — Artificial neural networks, Classification,
Data mining, Diseases prediction, K-Means.
I. INTRODUCTION
C LIMATIC changes and global warming produce
difficulties for agriculture production. In one hand people
have less pure arable land, and on other increasing number of
diseases and pests cause the use of much more chemicals.
Those chemicals applied in large quantities lead to soil
contamination, and could endanger human health. This
problem can be avoided by using chemicals at the right time,
when the least amount of them can suppress the concrete
pathogen or pest. In order to predict the right time for
suppression of pathogens many parameters must be
processed. For example, pathogen could infect fruit species
just under certain conditions. Those environmental stats could
be specific weather conditions like temperature, amount of
rainfall, humidity of air and leaf wetness. Other group of
conditions is the presence of active spores of a given
pathogen. Traditionally, in the cooperation with agricultural
experts, based on experience and knowledge, farmers are
making decision about a suitable time for the
protection of fruit from specific pathogens or pests.
Sometimes experience is not enough. For precise
Milos N. Ilic (contact author), Faculty of Technical Science Kosovska
Mitrovica, University of Pristina, Kneza Miloša 7, 38220 Kosovska
Mitrovica,Serbia (phone: 381-69-8702584 e-mail: milos.ilic@pr.ac.rs).
Petar C. Spalevic, Faculty of Technical Science Kosovska Mitrovica,
University of Pristina, Kneza Miloša 7, 38220 Kosovska
Mitrovica, Serbia (phone: 381-62-273813 e-mail:
petar.spalevic@pr.ac.rs).
Mladen Veinovic, Faculty of Informatics and Computing, Singidunum
University, Danijelova 32, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia (phone: 381-65-
3093227 e-mail: mveinovic@singidunum.ac.rs).
Abdolkarim A. Ennaas, Faculty of Informatics and Computing,
Singidunum University, Danijelova 32, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia (phone:
+381-11-3094094 e-mail: abdolkarim.ennaas@yahoo.com
978-1-5090-0055-5/15/$31.00 ©2015 IEEE
Serbia, Belgrade, November 24-26, 2015.
prediction of possible fruit infection, and correct time for
fruit protection data mining techniques can be used. Data
mining is most useful in an exploratory analysis scenario
in which there are no predetermined notions about what
will constitute an “interesting” outcome. It is a cooperative
effort of humans and computers. Best results are achieved
by balancing the knowledge of human experts with the
search capabilities of computers [1]. Data mining consist
of two primary goals, prediction and description. Here we
are interest for prediction. Prediction involves using
variables or fields in the data set to predict unknown or
future values of other variables of interest. Data mining is
emerging research field in Agriculture plant protection too.
For very recent applications of Data Mining techniques in
agriculture field different data mining techniques are in
use, such as K-Means, K-Nearest Neighbor (KNN),
Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) and Support Vector
Machines (SVM). In our research and system
implementation we will use new methodologies to predict
possible infection on the fruit plants. Consider that data are
available from some point back to the past, where the
corresponding pathogen infection has been recorded. In
every data mining procedure the training data collected
from some point back to the past is used in terms of
training which has to be exploited to learn how to classify
the possible emergence of diseases. This paper provides
overview of data mining techniques that can be used for
prediction in many different fields, and here authors
propose model for prediction of possible fruit infection.
II. RELATED APPLICATIONS
For our research we explored some papers in similar
areas of expertise. Related papers and research describe
two main problems that we must observe. First problem is
processing of meteorological data, obtained from a
meteorological radar centers. Second problem is
processing of data obtained from the devices called spores
traps. Final and most important goal which will result from
the previous two is prediction of possible diseases. For this
purpose we outlined a number of similar applications from
the reviewed literature, in which data mining techniques
are used for similar problems. One group of applications is
implementation of data mining techniques for processing
of meteorological data. Some of the data mining
techniques are related to weather conditions and forecasts.
For example, the K-Means algorithm is used to perform
forecast of the pollution in the atmosphere [2], the K
Nearest Neighbor (KNN) is applied for simulating daily
precipitations and other weather variables [3], and
different possible changes of the weather scenarios are
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analyzed using SVMs [4]. There are many studies that
support the applicability of data mining techniques for
weather prediction.
Authors in [5] presented a small application of CART
decision tree algorithm for weather prediction. The data
collected is registered over Hong Kong, and the data is
recorded between 2002 and 2005. The data used for
creating the dataset includes parameters year, month,
average pressure, relative humidity, clouds quantity,
precipitation and average temperature. WEKA, open
source data mining software, is used for the
implementation of CART decision tree algorithm. The
decision tree, results and statistical information about the
data are used to generate the decision model for prediction
of weather. The way the data about past events is stored is
highlighted. The data transformation is required according
to the decision tree algorithm in order to be efficiently
used by WEKA for weather prediction.
In [6] authors have predicted the hourly rainfall in any
geographical regions time efficiently. The chance of rain is
first determined. Then only if there is any chance of
rainfall, the hourly rainfall prediction is performed.
Although different methodologies have been introduced to
predict hourly prediction, most of them have performance
limitations because of the existence of wide range of
variation in data and limited amount of data. CART and
C4.5 are used to provide outcomes, which may provide
hidden and important patterns with transparent reasons.
About 18 variables were used from weather station. For
validation purpose, 10 fold cross validation method is
performed. CART gives slightly better performance than
C4.5. Considering the chances, only a small number of
instances are left for prediction which makes it hard to
predict. There are several applications of data mining
techniques in the field of agriculture. Data mining
techniques are often used to study soil characteristics. As
an example, the K-Means approach is used for classifying
soils in combination with GPS-based technologies [6].
K-Means approach is used to classify soils and plants
[7]. Some authors in [8] use SVMs to classify crops.
Apples are checked too, by using different approaches
before sending them to the market. In [9] authors use a K-
Means approach to analyze color images of fruits as they
run on conveyor belts. In [10] authors apply a supervised
biclustering technique to a dataset of wine fermentations
with the aim of selecting and discovering the features that
are responsible for the problematic fermentations and also
exploit the selected features for predicting the quality of
new fermentations.
Taste sensors are used to obtain data from the
fermentation process to be classified using ANNs [11].
SVMs are used for milk classification in [12]. Here
sensors are used to smell milk. Automatic methods for an
early detection of plant diseases are vital for precision crop
protection. Authors in [13] create a procedure for the early
detection and differentiation of sugar beet diseases based
on Support Vector Machines and spectral vegetation
indices. The discrimination between healthy sugar beet
leaves and diseased leaves resulted in classification
accuracies up to 97%. The multiple classifications between
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healthy leaves and leaves with symptoms of the three
diseases have achieved accuracy higher than 86%. All this
papers and research show that data mining techniques
provide good support for different agricultural problems.
All mentioned and implemented techniques are mainly
divided in two groups, classification and clustering
techniques. Classification techniques are designed to
classify unknown samples using information provided by a
set of classified samples. This set is usually referred to as a
training set as it is used to train the classification technique
how to perform its classification. Clustering is based on
grouping data according to the character, or to any
property that they have in common.
III. PROPOSED MODEL
A. Data collecting
Like we said above, for prediction of the possible fruit
and plant disease infection weather data and data about
active spores are important. Here we propose a model for
infection prediction based on data mining techniques. Two
key devices which collect data are automatic
meteorological (weather) stations and spore traps. An
automatic weather station is an automated version of the
traditional weather station, either to save human labor or to
enable measurements from remote areas. Automatic
weather station measures various meteorological
parameters such as wind speed, wind direction,
temperature, humidity, ambient pressure, atmospheric
pressure and rainfall. In special cases some additional
sensors can measure soil temperature, humidity leaf of
fruit trees.
The data collected in the weather station can be
monitored on site or transferred to a remote server. From
all this parameters for our research most important are air
temperature on the five centimeters from the ground, air
temperature on the one meter from the ground, rainfall and
humidity of the air and humidity of the fruit tree leaves.
One meteorological station will cover from eighty to a
hundred hectares. This is because weather conditions on
the larger surface can vary considerably, especially
rainfall. Automatic stations will measure and send data
every fifteen minutes. For manual stations measurements
will be carried out on eight hours.
An active pathogenic spore in appropriate weather
conditions can lead to fruit tree infection. By infection
agricultural sciences mean infection of leaves and fruit
berries. Classically detection and enumeration of airborne
spores has been achieved by microscopic examination of
surfaces on which spores were impacted. Spore traps have
been traditionally used to determine the spore density for
airborne plant pathogens.
For our system, microscopic data about registered active
spores of concrete pathogens are important. Spore traps
will be positioned on the same plantation where
meteorological stations are, but we need much more than
one trap. Examination of spore traps will be carried out
three times a day. Block scheme of the system is presented
in Fig. 1 bellow.

Fig. 1. Block scheme of the proposed system
A block which is called weather/meteorological stations
presents network of the meteorological stations. These
stations are positioned in advance determined locations
near the plantation. Parameters from both types of stations
will be saved in system database. From automatic stations
report will be send through the network, automatically.
Data from manual station must be entered by human. Data
collection can be automated if we have more automatic
stations with spore traps on them. Data from the electronic
microscope about identified spores (for which pathogen
spore is present, active or passive type of spore) will be
saved in the same database as meteorological data. More
spore traps provide better coverage. One spore trap will be
placed near the specific plant. In that way examination can
be significantly faster, because at the start we eliminate
spores that are not specific for disease attacking that plant.
Spore trap will be examined by the phytopathology. At
this stage, the data collection phase is over. By this we
mean on the data obtained in the current time. For
successful prediction, data from the previous ten and more
years will be entered in the database. Information about
identified infections on the field was obtained from
farmers and from official bodies in charge of monitoring
the occurrence of disease.
B. Data preprocessing
Data preprocessing must be applied on both
meteorological and data from electronic microscope. Data
preprocessing is often neglected but important step in the
data mining process. Data gathering methods are often
lightly controlled, resulting in out-of-range values,
impossible data combinations (Temperature: 29oC, Snow:
Yes), missing values, etc. Analyzing data that has not been
carefully screened for such problems could produce
misleading results. Thus, the representation and quality of
data could be crucial for analysis process. Steps like data
preparation and filtering could take considerable amount
of processing time. Data preprocessing includes cleaning,
normalization, transformation, feature extraction,
selection, etc. The product of the data preprocessing is the
final training set. For our research other weather
parameters besides the above mentioned are not necessary.
Such parameters that are coming from digital
meteorological stations will be removed in this step.
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C. Data processing
In this phase the final data set organized in
preprocessing phase will be processed by different data
mining techniques. Data about identified spores will be
classified according to the group of diseases that can
cause. Beside this, spores for each pathogen are classified
in two types. First type represents active spores, meaning
that such spores could cause diseases in appropriate
weather conditions. Second type represents passive spores.
Passive spores can’t cause infection, although weather
conditions are fulfilled. Data collected from the
meteorological stations are more numerous. For each
parameter measurement is repeated many times during the
day. This causes big set of meteorological data for model
training. Depending of meteorological data category,
different classification or clustering techniques can be
used. Technique selection must be based on results that
concrete technique provides. From all of the collected
meteorological and data about spores we create training
file. This file starts with attributes definition of all data.
That means we must define if concrete attribute is numeric
or nominal. The last attribute represents class attribute.
Attributes must have defined order of appearance in each
instance. In that order we input values for concrete disease
or group of diseases. Instances first have meteorological
parameters, after that characteristic of the spores, and at
the end class value. Based on those instances we will
create training model. Number of instances is very
important. Increasing number of instances provides better
training model. For created file we apply different
classification techniques, and measure percentage of
corrected classified instances, standard deviation, mean
absolute error, relative absolute error, and root relative
squared error. A technique that gives the best results will
be chosen for creation of training model. In order to
evaluate different data mining techniques we create
training dataset. Given dataset contains data from one year
long timespan. This dataset is created for two specific
diseases. Over this data we apply multiple data mining
techniques. Classification results are presented in Table 1.
For this evaluation we used WEKA classes implemented
in C# form application.
TABLE 1: CLASSIFICATION RESULTS AND STATISTICS
Classifier output J48 SMO ZeroR
Cor. classified instances 90.32% 85.25% 73.77%
Incor. classified instances 9.68% 14.75% 26.23%
Mean absolute error 0.0985 0.2659 0.2783
Standard deviation 0.2812 0.3414 0.3681
Relative absolute error 25.39% 95.55% 100%
Root relative squared e. 64.06% 92.75 100%
For all classifiers we perform 10-fold cross-validation,
without percentage split. This means that we use whole
dataset for training. Evaluation helps us to choose the best
technique for model creation. After the evaluation, training
model that will be used for prediction is build. For that
purpose we use classifier that shows best results. This is
very important because if we build better training model
prediction will be more accurate. From the table above we
can see that J48 classifier provides the highest percentage
of correctly classified instances. Because of that fact in
this case we will choose to build training model with J48.
D. Prediction
For disease infection all mentioned parameters must
have values in specific range. Based on classified data
from the training model, we can predict if appropriate
conditions for possible infection are satisfied. From this
moment we use created trained model for prediction. New
set of instances provided from the meteorological stations
and laboratory will be used for test dataset creation. Test
dataset has the same form like training dataset. For the
class values we can input two types of values. First is
question mark that indicates that we do not know which
class value is appropriate for that set of data. In the second
case we can predict the class value intuitively, and input
our prediction. After entering all the current values of the
instances in the dataset, prediction can start.
In prediction phase we use our saved training model.
For the prediction we must select the classifier used for
model creation. Prediction output will be class value for
each instance, regardless of whether we put a question
mark or predicted value. Despite this, degree of probability
is also essential. Degree of probability will vary depending
on the values of the current parameters. If current values
for all parameters are similar with corresponding values
from the training set, model will predict that probability
for infection is in the similar range.
For the predicted value, if there is just one disease in the
training and testing set, and conditions for that disease are
fulfilled, we will get answer. If we have more than one
possible disease, output will be the one with the highest
probability.
We use mathematical regression methods for
verification of the results obtained by WEKA
classification algorithms. Mathematical regression and
statistics calculations will be obtained by MatLab. After
confirming predictions, and if some infection is possible
farmers will be notified. Notification will contain
information about present disease, and a proposal of
measures. For notification like this we must create farmers
database, and provide message or mail service.
IV. CONCLUSION
Agricultural production is complex job. One of the most
unpredictable and complex task is chemical protection.
The key factor for successful chemical fruit protection
from diseases and pests is nothing but the right moment.
This means that the selection of chemicals is not as
complex as timing determination for protection. Early fruit
disease detection has a lot of benefits. From the angle of
farmers, methods like suggested one provide important
information for successful chemical protection. Second
benefit for the farmers is economical. They can save
money if they reduce numbers of chemical treatments.
This is because model indicates when conditions for
diseases development are not fulfilled. In that case
chemical treatment is not needed. From the perspective of
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healthy foods, reduced number of chemical treatments is
very important. With appropriate detection and prediction
we could get successful chemical protection and healthy
food.
Authors’ future research will be implementation and
integration of proposed model in real terms. Authors plan
to create much bigger training dataset, with instances from
about twenty years in the past. New parameters from the
real world will be collected from automatic meteorological
stations mounted on plantations. Obtained results will
show the degree of accuracy of the practical application of
the proposed model.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This paper is result of collaboration with the Ministry of
Education, Science and Technological Development of
Republic of Serbia within the projects TR 32023 and TR
35026.
The authors are grateful to the professors from College
of agriculture and food technology in Prokuplje, for their
collaboration in order to acquire basic knowledge on
certain plant pathogens.
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