Though biological products, such as plant extractions, are no longer novel concepts to ordinary customers, the public still lacks adequate knowledge to preserve their products. For instance, some people are unaware of the possible contamination of the bacteria when they place back the half-used packages back in the fridge. Thus, we wish to introduce the notion of harmless biotechnological products and proper means of storage through our hardware. We target several considerations including food safety, ease to use, and health considerations, and designed Protective Phytochemical Quantifier (PPQ). Our product aims to expand synthetic biology product usage in the food industry, focusing on daily usage.
Anthocyanins are water-soluble, heat and light-sensitive. When the air humidity is high, anthocyanins may form several clumps that cause problems for actual use. For instance, salts and table sugar clump in humid seasons in Shanghai, where our team is located. On the other hand, anthocyanins spoil when the temperature is high or being exposed to strong light. Therefore, it is necessary to provide anthocyanins with a low-temperature, dry, and dark environment. Therefore, our design contains drying, cooling, and accurately controlling the flow of anthocyanin powder functions.
The tank is divided into three functional areas. The outermost layer aims to insulate the heat, which consists of two layers of stainless steel and heat-insulating filling. Within the sealed layer, the anthocyanin tank also consists of food storage stainless steel. Inside the container, temperature, and humidity sensors, and a blender is installed to prevent any circumstances that may lead to a reduction in anthocyanin's efficacy. Additionally, silicone desiccant is contained in a single layer to maintain the low humidity inside the container.
With the aid of the temperature and humidity sensor, we are able to monitor both factors inside the tank and design software to manipulate it automatically. When the temperature is above 16 degrees Celsius, the cooling plate is activated automatically.
A stepper motor is used to rotate the screw so that the powder can be rotated out bit by bit, which is convenient for controlling the discharge. Unlike the ordinary DC motor, in which the ordinary DC current will continue to rotate a bit even if the power supply is stopped due to inertia, the stepper motor rotates step by step and will not be affected by inertia. Additionally, the PID algorithm can be applied to control the speed of the stepper motor, slowing down when a certain amount of powder has already been rotated out.
The measuring structure is divided into upper and lower layers, which is similar to a coffee machine. We put our gravity sensor under the structure. When we need to measure the quantity, we just need to put the container into the device. In our design of the software, the customers can input the value of the powder they want and the system will automatically measure precisely the amount of powder.
All material used that has contact with anthocyanin are good for food safety. The wires, DC power supplies, and step-down modules we use to build the circuit are all market currency versions that have been checked for proper use. Under the condition that the circuit input and output are well connected, we use the step-down module to step down the battery voltage. The frequency of the voltage is within our calculation range.
In our early design and the first version of our hardware, we planned only to warn our users when the temperature is inadequate instead of controlling the temperature. However, we discovered that our targeted customer includes ones that are old and not sensitive to the information provided on our screen. Besides, the first users reported that the anthocyanin powder often keeps coming out of the container after they stop pressing the button. These problems reported inspired us to include the core notions of the PID algorithm and improved our fundamental designs.
PPC is currently too big for children and patients. We would like to further our inclusivity consideration in the future by developing our home-based anthocyanin storage device into a smaller, more portable one.
Additionally, the software can be adjusted to control the inner environment of the tank to fit into the preferred ones of any powder products. Changing the innermost tank and delivery system, we are able to store and measure any form of products with such single device.