Virtual prototyping a modular robotic system for mushroom controlled cultivation and integrated processing.

Nicolescu, Adrian ; Enciu, George ; Dobrescu, Tiberiu 等

1. INTRODUCTION

In a previous paper, an automatic installation with a modular structure dedicated for continuous processing of sacks containing sterilized compost inoculated with productive mycelium, and alimentary and therapeutic mushrooms production was developed. The installation included several unsterile zones (ZN-A ... ZN-K) for compost preparation, as well as several sterile zones (ZS-A ... ZS-K) for both automatic sterilization and inoculation of the sacks containing secondary mycelium compost and for therapeutic mushrooms cultivation, harvest and processing. This approach has some important advantages versus conventional technologies, including total sterile conditions for appropriate biological material cultivation by eliminating any hazards regarding human contamination of the workspace. This is done by preventing human access in the sterile zones, because the sacks handling, transport, transfer, storage, inoculation, cooling, sterilizing, harvesting and other operations are performed by modular robotic equipments.

The central operation of the process, the inoculation of the compost sacks with secondary mycelium, is performed by a gantry robot with three degrees of freedom, with a special design (Petre et al., 2008). The section of the installation that incorporates the inoculation robot is shown in Fig. 1.

[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]

2. SECTION DETAILED STRUCTURE AND FUNCTIONING

The sterile zone D (ZS-D) is designed for automatic transfer and transport of the sacks from zone C (ZS-C) to zone E (ZS-E) and includes an automatic pallet transfer system that moves the pallets from the cooling area to the temporary storage posts, where the inoculation process will take place.

The sterile zone E (ZS-E) is designed for the automatic inoculation with liquid mycelium of the compost sacks. It includes temporary pallets storage posts and a gantry robot with two degrees of freedom and a multiple end-effector that can simultaneously inoculate the sacks on the same support with a controlled volume of liquid mycelium. This is accomplished by repeatedly positioning the end-effector according to each pallet's coordinates.

The sterile zone F (ZS-F) is designed for sacks manipulation and transfer from zone E (ZS-E) to zone G (ZS-G) and includes a pallet transfer system which moves the sacks from the inoculation area to a transfer gate in the sterile zone H (ZS-H) (Nicolescu et al., 2009).

3. INOCULATION ROBOT

The robot has the role to inoculate mycelium in the compost sacks. For this purpose, it will gradually position itself above each inoculation post, and the end-effector will perform the operation in three sacks simultaneously. The mycelium is uniformly stored in a low-capacity collector and transported by a pump and several injectors. After the inoculation, the robot will retract to a home position, allowing the recharging of the collector. The robot is specially design for sterile environment operations (Nicolescu, 2005).

The overall layout of the gantry robot is shown in Fig 3. The robot has three degrees of freedom, as following: X longitudinal axis, Y transversal axis and the Z vertical axis. The driving system is entirely composed of electrical motors, and the programming is made through teach-in techniques (Nicolescu, 2009).

4. SECTION AND ROBOT VIRTUAL PROTOTYPING

During the second development phase, virtual prototyping for all sections has been performed. For exemplifying specific achievements in this work, Fig. 2a and 2b present overall structure of inoculation section, Fig. 3a and 3b present overall structure of the included gantry robot, and finally Fig. 4 illustrates specific design features of robot Z vertical axis as well as inoculation effector and related complementary equipment (Petre et al., 2009).

[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]

[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]

[FIGURE 4 OMITTED]

5. CONCLUSION

The modular robotic system presented in this paper, already patent protected, is the first fully automated mushrooms cultivation and conditioning integrated system. Achievements in performing virtual prototyping of inoculation section from a modular robotic system for mushroom controlled cultivation and integrated processing have been presented. Similar tasks have been performed for all sections of the modular robotic system. Real scale production system will be fully operational starting at June 2011. Next phases including functioning simulation, detailed design phases, system's sections building up and testing, as well as overall system programming and real functioning adjusting will be presented in further papers.

6. REFERENCES

Nicolescu, A. (2005). Industrial Robots (in Romanian), EDP Publishing House, Bucharest, Romania

Nicolescu, A. (2009). Industrial Robots Implemented into Robotic Manufacturing Systems (work in progress in Romanian), EDP Publishing House, Bucharest, Romania

Nicolescu, A.; Enciu, G.; Ivan, M.; Dobre, M. & Petre, M. (2009), Conceptual model of a modular robotic system for mushroom's controlled cultivation and integrated processing, Proceedings of The 20th International DAAAM Symposium, 25-28th November 2009

Petre M.; Nicolescu A. & Dobre M. (2008). Biotechnological model for controlled cultivation and integrated processing of mushrooms in a modular robotic system for obtaining ecological products in alimentary security and safety conditions, Contact Nr. 52143, National R&D Program PNCDI-2, Prioritary domains partnership

Petre M.; Nicolescu A. & Dobre M. (2008) An approach and an installation for alimentary and therapeutic mushrooms cultivation, patent request nr 00610, Official Bulletin of Industrial Property--Inventions Section, OSIM, Bucharest