Exploring multispectral iris recognition beyond 900nm

Most iris recognition systems acquire images of the eye in the 700 nm-900 nm range of the electromagnetic spectrum. In this work, the iris is examined at wavelengths beyond 900 nm. The purpose is to understand the iris structure at longer wavelengths and to determine the possibility of performing cross-spectral iris matching. An acquisition system is first designed for imaging the iris at narrow spectral bands in the 950 nm-1650 nm range. Next, the left and right images of the iris are acquired from 25 subjects in order to conduct the analysis. Finally, the possibility of performing cross-spectral matching and multispectral fusion at the match score level is investigated. Experimental results suggest: (a) the feasibility of acquiring iris images in wavelengths beyond 900 nm using InGaAs detectors; (b) the possibility of observing different structures in the iris anatomy at various wavelengths; and (c) the potential of performing cross-spectral matching and multispectral fusion for enhanced iris recognition.