A comparative study of 2D UMI and 3D zernike shape descriptor for ATS drugs identification

Abstract

Drug abuse is a threat to national development. Generally, drugs can be identified based on the structure of its molecular components. This procedure is becoming more unreliable with the introduction of new amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) molecular structures which are increasingly complex and sophisticated. An in-depth study is crucial to accurately identify the unique characteristics of molecular structure in ATS drug. Therefore, this chapter is meant for exploring the usage of shape descriptors (SD) to represent the drug molecular structure. Twodimensional (2D) united moment invariant (UMI) and three-dimensional (3D) Zernike are selected and their performances are analyzed using drug chemical structures obtained from United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and various sources. The evaluation identifies the most interesting method to be further explored and adapted in the future work to fully compatible with ATS drug identification domain.