NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering

Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

Complex Resistivity (CR) of Wood and Standing Trees

Tina MARTIN1
1
BAM Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing, Berlin, Germany,
tina.martin@bam.de

Abstract
Complex resistivity (CR) has been used to investigate the properties and the extent of damage
in wood and standing trees. Our laboratory experiments have proved that wood’s anisotropy
influences its electrical behaviour. It is a well-established fact that wood exhibits the lowest
resistivity amplitudes in the axial direction compared to that in tangential and radial
directions. It has been shown that anisotropy affects not only the amplitude but also the phase.
Phase values are the highest in the axial direction, particularly in the lower frequency range.
The changes in resistivity due to fungi-induced damage were investigated in a long-term
laboratory test. With progressing damage, both resistivity and phase decrease. The phase also
shows sensitivity to the changes in the structure of wood cell. CR Tomography (CRT) has
been employed in the field to detect fungi-infected zones in fallen trees. A number of factors
such as the type and age of the tree, and the season seem to influence the CRT results. Among
those, the effect of seasonal changes has been demonstrated here. Furthermore CRT can be
used to characterise fungi-infected zones in the tree.

Keywords
Tree investigation, complex resistivity tomography, wood anisotropy, fungi, oak

Résumé
La résistivité complexe (CR) a été employée pour étudier les propriétés et la stabilité du bois
et des arbres vivants. Nos expériences en laboratoire ont vérifié que l'anisotropie du bois
influence son comportement électrique. On sait que le bois montre les plus basses amplitudes
de résistivité dans la direction axiale comparée aux directions tangentielles et radiales. Notre
expérience a également démontré que l'anisotropie affecte non seulement l'amplitude mais
également la phase. Les valeurs de phase sont les plus hautes dans la direction axiale
particulièrement dans la gamme de fréquence inférieure. Des dommages Mycète-induits ont
été étudiés par un essai de laboratoire de CR pendant une période dépassant un an. Pendant
que les dommages progressent, la résistivité et la phase diminuent. La phase montre
également la sensibilité aux changements de la structure de la cellule en bois. Le CRT a été
utilisé dans le domaine pour détecter des zones mycète-infectées dans les arbres qui sont
tombés. Un certain nombre de facteurs tels que le type d'arbre, l'âge et la saison ont un
impact sur les résultats de CRT. L'influence des changements saisonniers sur un arbre de
chêne sain a été montrée ici. Les tomogrammes de CR enregistrés au cours des trois dernières
années montrent la sensibilité à l'humidité du bois.

1 Introduction
Complex Resistivity (CR) is a conventional geophysical method which uses alternating
current to measure the difference in the voltage within a broad frequency range (1 mHz to
1000 Hz). The frequency spectra can be interpreted using various models. It is possible to
deduce information about environmental contamination from SIP data. Using CR, the
amplitude and the phase of the complex resistivity provide complementary information about
decay and the level of damage in wood. CR Tomography can then be developed as a modified
 NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering
Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

version of the geoelectrical tomography method [1] to investigate standing trees. The usually
invasive point measurement methods used provide only punctual information about the decay.
In contrast, tomographic methods can give imaging information about the entire plane
investigated. Unlike Computer Tomography (CT) the application of tomographic methods in
wood investigation is rare. Although CT [2] provides very good results, its application is
rather complicated. Acoustic tomography has also been used for this purpose but the
interpretation of its results has not yet fully been established [3].

2 Laboratory Measurements
For the laboratory measurements we used the CR equipment SIP256c. We measured in the
frequency range from 1 mHz to 100 Hz. The wood samples (diameter ~ 20 mm, length ~ 70
mm) were placed in a measuring cell with two taps for the current (outer taps, Figure 1 left)
and two taps for the voltage measurements (inner taps), so it was measured in a 4-point-array.
The first experiment will show the effect of the strong anisotropy in the wood’s complex
resistivity. This anisotropy is caused by the naturally inhomogeneous structure of the trees. To
understand the effect of fungi damage on complex resistivity, a long-term experiment with
Daedalea quercina was carried out. It will be described afterwards.

Figure 1: Left: Measuring cell for laboratory measurements. Right: Assembly for field measurements.

2.1 Anisotropy
To estimate the degree of the influence of anisotropy on the amplitude and the phase of
complex resistivity, laboratory measurements were carried out on oak along the main
directions axial (along the growth direction), radial (perpendicular to the growth direction)
and tangential (along the annual ring). The results are shown in Figure 2. The axial samples
show the lowest resistivity (Figure 2a). The resistivity of the radial samples is more than two
times greater (around 410 Ωm) than that of the axial ones. However, the greatest resistivity
was observed in the tangential samples, for which resistivities were measured almost four
times greater than those for the axial samples.
Anisotropy influences not only the amplitude, but also the phase measurements (Figure 2b).
The strongest phase effect was observed in the axial direction. The radial samples show much
less phase effect and the tangential samples show almost none at all. The peak of the phase
curves is also different for different directions. The axial peak occurs at a frequency of about
f = 0.01Hz while the radial phase peak occurs around f = 0.1Hz. For the tangential curves no
distinguished phase peak is detectable.
Summing up, the anisotropy of wood affects both the amplitude and the phase of the complex
resistivity. Because of the considerable anisotropy-induced differences in resistivity and
phase, it is important to record the direction along which the field measurement have been
taken.
 NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering
Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

800 2.5
a) b) oak samples
axial 1
2 axial 2
600 axial 3
radial 1
resistivity [Ohm*m]

radial 2
1.5

- phase [°]
tangential 1
tangential 2
400
tangential 3
1

200
0.5

0 0
0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10 100 0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10 100
frequency [Hz] frequency [Hz]

Figure 2: Resistivity and phase directional measurements for oak samples

2.2 Long-term-experiment on fungi-infected wood

Daedalea quercina is a brown-root producing fungus damaging mainly the heartwood of the
trees. For this experiment, 50 wood samples along the radial and axial direction were cut,
sterilized, oven-dried and injected with the fungus and an agar-malt-solution in a Petri dish.
After six weeks the first four samples (two axial and two radial ones) were extracted from the
Petri dish, weighed and their complex resistivity was measured. From then on, four new
samples were extracted and investigated every other week. After each measurement, the
samples were oven-dried again to obtain the mass loss caused by the fungi.
The change in resistivity and phase at the frequency of the phase peak over the elapsed time
are shown in Figure 3. First, the resistivity of the samples decreases with time. But, after 22
weeks (for radial samples, Figure 3c) and 25 weeks (for axial samples, Figure 3a) the
resistivity of the samples begins suddenly to increase. In phase measurements, this abrupt
change is however not visible. The phase decreases as a function of time over the whole
period of the test. The decrease is more explicit for radial samples (Figure 3d) than for axial
samples (Figure 3b).
These results show that resistivity is very sensitive to the effect of moisture. Fungi need
moisture to grow and develop which they extract from the air and the agar-malt-solution,
therefore resistivity first decreases. After 22 –25 weeks the resistivity increases. There are two
possible reasons for the phenomena: by this time the fungi have decomposed everything they
were able to or they did not manage to adsorb any more moisture so they died early and the
wood dried.
The results in Figure 4a of the same samples indicate furthermore that a big change in the
resistivity only occurs when the wood moisture content is low (< 50%). For higher moisture
contents, the changes are marginal.
However, the phase decreases over the entire infection time. That can also be seen by the
reduction of the mass loss of the same infected samples in Figure 4b. The reduction of the
mass loss amounts to the decomposition of the wood caused by fungi. That means that the
phase is sensitive to changes in the structure of the wood cell which is caused by the fungi.
 NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering
Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

1000000 2
axial samples
a) @ 0.01 Hz b) axial samples
@ 0.01 Hz
100000
1.5

resistivity [Ohm*m]

- phase [°]
10000
1
1000

0.5
100

10 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
time with fungus [weeks] time with fungus [weeks]
1000000 2
c) radial samples d) radial samples
100000 @ 0.1 Hz @ 0.1 Hz
1.5
resistivity [Ohm*m]

- phase [°]
10000
1
1000

0.5
100

10 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45
time with fungus [weeks] time with fungus [weeks]

Figure 3: Resistivity and phase for axial (red triangles) and radial (blue crosses) wood samples infected by
the fungus Daedalea quercina for different infection times.
10000 2

a) b) radial @ 0.1 Hz
axial @ 0.01 Hz
resistivity [Ohm*m]

1.5
1000
- phase [°]

100
0.5

10 0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
wood moisture [%] reduction of the mass loss [%]

Figure 4: Resistivity vs. wood moisture (left) and phase vs. change in the mass loss for axial and radial
samples.

3 Field measurement
The laboratory measurement system described above can be extended to a 24-channel system
applicable for the field tomography measurements. Steel nails were used as electrodes and
applied at an equidistant pitch around the perimeter of the trunk (Figure 1 right). To reduce
the duration of the test, a frequency range of 0.1 to 10Hz was used. The measured data were
inverted by the reconstruction program DC2dTree [4]. Starting with a homogenous seed
model, the program uses an iterative approach to reconstruct the inner structure to match the
resistivity data. In the current version it is possible to include the geometry of the trunk in the
reconstruction program but not the anisotropy and the three-dimensionality of the tree.
Ignoring the anisotropy can cause big measurement differences (compare section 2.1). But for
 NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering
Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

tomography measurements along a horizontal section of the trunk the current propagation is
similar in radial and tangential direction. Although there are differences between these
directions, they were negligible for the inversion.
Along with the CRT measurements, the drill resistance test was also conducted. The
equipment used IML-Resi E500 measures the mechanical strength (density) of the wood. In
this method a very long needle is driven into the tree. The mechanical resistance is then
measured by the power that is necessary to drive the needle into the tree. Driving the needle
into strong wood takes more power (higher amplitude) than into infected, i.e. soft wood.

3.1 Seasonal Influence

As expected, seasonal changes proved to have a great influence on the CRT results. Because
of the dependency of the resistivity on water content (wood moisture) and temperature, the
tomograms change considerably with the change of the season. The tomograms for a typically
healthy oak measured in summer and winter are shown in Figure 5 (frequency f = 0.1Hz). In
summer the oak has an outer ring of low resistivity (Figure 5a) and low phases (Figure 5b).
That is the area of the sapwood where the nutriment and water transport (sap flow) take place.
The compact and lignificated heartwood is characterized by a zone of high resistivity and high
phases. In the middle of the tree there is again a good conducting zone characterized by low
phases. That occurs because of the storage of the good-conducting phenolics (tanning agent)
during lignification. In the winter time, while the tomograms maintain their ring-like
structure, the resistivities (Figure 5c) are much higher than those measured in summer time.
Furthermore, the sapwood ring can no longer be recognized because the tree has no sap flow
in the cold season. The phase tomogram (Figure 5d) shows only a slight change because the
phase is not as sensitive to the moisture as resistivity.

Figure 5: Tomograms of a healthy oak in summer and winter. The typical oak has a ring-like structure in
resistivity and phase.
 NDTCE’09, Non-Destructive Testing in Civil Engineering
Nantes, France, June 30th – July 3rd, 2009

3.2 Fungi-infected Oak

Figure 6 shows an example of a fungi-infected oak. As shown in Figure 6a there is a hole in
the centre of the tree. Around the hole the wood is also infected and is already brittle. The
hole produces a zone of very high resistivities (Figure 6b) and very low phases (Figure 6c).
Around the hole the fungi are still progressing, so the resistivities as well as the phases are
fairly low. The healthy parts of wood are characterized by moderate (~300 Ωm) resistivities
and high phases. The drill resistance measurements used also indicate a huge weak zone in the
centre of the tree. The results of drill resistance are generally in agreement with those of CRT.
However, on the left border the drill resistance still indicates strong wood, but the electrical
resistivity and phase yield that the border is already infected by the fungi. So the wood on this
border might be already infected by the fungi but the decomposition is still going on.

Figure 6: Photo with the drill resistance results (a), tomograms of resistivity (b) and phase (c) of a fungi-
infected tree.

4 Conclusions
Our laboratory measurements have demonstrated that the anisotropy of wood has a significant
influence on complex resistivity. Also, progressive fungi infection affects the resistivity
characteristic, which can be used to differentiate between healthy and damaged wood.
Resistivity tomography measurements were also conducted in the field. Because of the
correlation between resistivity and wood moisture, the seasonal changes were indicated
clearly. Measurement results on fungi-infected trees demonstrated the applicability of the
method in non-destructive testing for tree investigation.

References
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Widerstandstomographie. Forst und Holz, volume 54, pages166 - 170, 1999.
2. A. Habermehl and H.-W. Ridder. Computer-Tomographie in der Forstwirtschaft und
Baumpflege (part 1). DGZfP-Zeitung 55, pages 48 - 55, 1996.
3. S. Rust, S. Franz, M. Minke, I. Schumann, and A. Roloff. Schalltomographie zur
Erkennung von Fäule und Höhlungen an stehenden Bäumen. Stadt + Grün, pages 50 - 52,
June 2002.
4. Th. Günther. Impedanztomographie an Bäumen unter Berücksichtigung der
Baumform. Manual zu DC2dTree, 2005.