METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR MEASURING QUANTITY OF COMPONENT OF LEAF

摘要

PURPOSE:To obtain highly reliable method and apparatus for measuring the quantity of nitrogen essential for the growth of plant directly and conveniently while enhancing the accuracy. CONSTITUTION:A leaf 2 to be measured is irradiated with infrared light having an arbitrary wavelength related to the components of the leaf and the transmitted and reflected lights are received, respectively, by means 10 and 12 in order to determine the quantity of transmitted and reflected lights. The absorbance of the leaf is then determined based on the quantity of transmitted and reflected lights and a formula for estimating the quantity of components of the leaf is determined through multiple regression analysis of the absorbance of a leaf having known quantity of components irradiated with near infrared rays of arbitrary wavelength and known quantity of components thereof. The quantity of components of the leaf is determined according to the estimation formula using the absorbance thus determined.