Topic > Spirulina Growing System for Smart People

IndexNutritional Contents in SpirulinaOptical Density Based Feedback Feeding MethodAlgae Cultivation Using Microcontroller PlatformGrowth Yield of Spirulina Maxima in PhotobioreactorsMass Production of SpirulinaEvaluation TechniquesComponent DescriptionArduino MicrocontrollerPin DescriptionIR SensorModule Sim 800aSpirulina is unicellular and filamentous blue - green algae. Many species from the algae and cyanobacteria category have shown anti-tumor effects in animal tests, and some of them are currently undergoing clinical trials. Especially Spirulina Platensis, which is the species subject of this study, has shown antiviral, antiepileptic and many other medically active properties. Due to this popularity, the consumption of microalgae products is rapidly increasing and the need for stable and efficient production of microalgae arises. However, technical and financial limitations and stable mass production of microalgae are not easy tasks to solve. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayPrecise control of environmental conditions in the place where microalgae grow and timely supply of necessary materials would be the key requirements for stable growth of microalgae. This requirement could be sufficient through mass cultivation and an automated microcontroller system. The Smart Spirulina system is developed and evaluated to bring automation to the entire Spirulina algae production. The main objective of the system is to avoid human intervention and design a system that is incorporated with various sensor units and a stirrer. The sensor unit can monitor the tank for the overall process. The project includes an RTC (Real Time Clock) module connected to a DC motor used to automatically agitate the tank every hour. Sensors such as pH sensor and temperature sensor are used for daily monitoring of algae conditions. The IR sensor is used to determine the growth of Spirulina. Once the algae is ready for harvesting, a notification is sent to the farmer via the GSM module. Spirulina is a freshwater blue-green algae that was the first plant life on earth nearly three billion years ago. Spirulina is a concentrate of nutrients that forty years ago the United Nations declared to be the healthiest food in the world. The nutritional profile of seaweed is so impressive that the scientific, nutritional, sports and medical communities have conducted over 100,000 scientific studies on its health benefits [1]. Spirulina provides the highest concentration of protein in the world, all in the form of amino acids essential for muscle, health and cell growth. Its over forty nutrients ensure complete nutritional health and its natural nitric oxide provides immediate and long-lasting physical and mental energy. Spirulina is also rich in all the B vitamins, all the electrolytes and other minerals you need to be healthy, including zinc and magnesium. Various health benefits of Spirulina are: helps in improving athletic performance, powerful antioxidant, protects the brain, boosts immunity, provides physical energy and mental awakening, helps in building muscles, stopping fatigue and also in losing weight . It is also a great substitute for animal proteins or vegetables. As a result, the commercial production of spirulina has gained worldwide attention for use in human dietary supplements, animal feed, and pharmaceuticals. The growth of Spirulina and thecomposition of the biomass produced depend on many factors, the most important of which are the availability of nutrients, temperature and light [1]. Furthermore, Spirulina requires high pH values ​​between 10 and 10.5, which effectively inhibit contamination by most algae in the culture. Cost-effective Spirulina production is necessary when considering large-scale cultivation for industrial purposes. The cost of nutrients is considered the second main factor influencing the cost of spirulina biomass production after labor. In this study, Zarrouk soil is used for the cultivation and production of Spirulina. Zarrouk soil has successfully served as the standard medium for Spirulina culture for many years. Nutritional Content in Spirulina United Nations data shows that over 250 million children suffer from malnutrition. Spirulina has a very high micronutrient content and is easy and economical to produce locally. It is therefore a very realistic and also sustainable solution to the problem of malnutrition. Spirulina contains 28.9 mg of iron in 100 g of product, which is 210% of the recommended daily intake. Furthermore, studies have revealed that it contains a lot of vitamin B. 100g Spirulina platensis can contain 207% of the recommended daily amount of thiamine (vitamin B1) and 306% of the recommended daily amount of riboflavin (vitamin B2). Thanks to these study results, many pharmaceutical or health supplement companies have highlighted the potential of Spirulina. For all these reasons, the production of Spirulina is considered essential to revolutionize the growth of algae. Yao Yao et al improved a previously developed optical density (OD) sensor for measuring biomass concentration in algae cultures and tested the performance of the improved sensor. The sensor has been improved in the following aspects. First, the sensor housing has been redesigned to accommodate a new optical measurement setup and reference cell. Secondly, a constant current LED driver circuit was built and included. Third, a feedback-controlled mechanism (including thermistors and thermoelectric cooling modules) was built to control the temperature of the LEDs. Ultimately, a logarithmic IC chip was used to process the raw results of the photodiodes. Optical density-based feedback power methodBao, Yilu et al. The proposed method for growing Spirulina platensis using ammonium salts or ammonium-containing wastewater as alternative sources of nitrogen is considered as a commercial way to reduce costs. In this research, analyzing the relationship between biomass production and ammonium-N consumption in fed-batch culture of Spirulina platen sis using ammonium bicarbonate as a nitrogen nutrient source, an online adaptive control strategy based on optical density measurements (OD) for ammonium supply control. Algae Culture Using Minju Microcontroller Platform Jennifer Kim et al stated that Spirulina plantensis, many microalgae have gained attention from a diverse field of different research fields due to the highly applicable potentials on many global problems such as energy depletion and greenhouse effects. The consumption of microalgae products is increasing rapidly and the need for stable and efficient production of microalgae arises. The microcontroller system could be more elaborately applied in algae culture technologies. Growth yield of Spirulina Maxima in photobioreactors A. Saeid and K. Chojnacka deal with the evaluation ofparameters for the cultivation of Spirulina maxima in two reactors (large laboratory scale (LL) and semi-technical (ST)), whose illuminated volumes are different, and operating costs. It has been demonstrated that cultivation of Spirulina maxima can be carried out under temperate climatic conditions in simply constructed low-cost reactors. Mass Production of Spirulina Avigad Vonshak and Amos Richmond examined the details of the basic requirements required to achieve high productivity and low production cost. There is a need for a wide variety of algae species and strains that respond favorably to different environmental conditions existing outdoors. Another essential requirement is the construction of better bioreactors, improving existing types of open channels or developing tubular closure systems. The next solution seems more promising. These developments must overcome the main limitation facing the sector today, which is that the overall low real yields are too lower than the theoretical maximum and which are associated with scaling up microalgae culture to commercial size. Evaluation Techniques Most farmers grow Spirulina in open canals, shallow ponds and use paddle wheels to move the water. The motors that pump fresh water into Spirulina ponds can use solar cells to minimize energy consumption and waste. These bacteria can double their biomass every two to five days. Farmers can easily convert infertile lands into ponds for growing Spirulina as these ponds can work anywhere. Growers must continually add fresh, clean water and nutrients to keep Spirulina thriving. Spirulina mostly needs nitrogen, potassium and iron, so farmers need to add these nutrients to the water. Spirulina culture changes rapidly if not cared for properly. Crops can grow rapidly or die in less than a few hours. Spirulina ponds are easily contaminated with toxic microorganisms, and farmers must carefully monitor environmental conditions. Therefore, spirulina must be grown in artificial ponds [2]. Water should always be kept between 84 and 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Spirulina needs sunlight, so any grow room should be able to provide it. It is also important that the premise can provide shade, as direct sunlight can damage Spirulina, especially in its early stages. The Spirulina used here is grown in an outdoor pond/pool. Since this is an open pond, a cover is needed to protect from rain, as rain will dilute the growing crop and alter the pH level. It is also important when the pool is exposed to strong winds that carry dust and soil, as well as in cases where there are many insects. The pond should be cleaned of sediment every six months. During cleaning, the liquid containing spirulina is transferred to another pool, tub or even into pots and buckets. The water and soap used for dishes are excellent for cleaning the pool. In the existing system, an Arduino microcontroller is used to monitor the algae culture medium [3]. The completed microcontroller system was placed and carefully secured to the back side of the culture vessel in a closed chamber with an acrylic plastic lid equipped with antibacterial HEPA filters and electric fans. The system should detect more parameters and respond accordingly. For example, when the room space is above 35ₒC, the electric fan turns on to cool the climate temperature. It also detects pH, temperature range andthe intensity of the light. On the other hand, sound alerts and warning LED have been triggered when the parameters are out of range in the software sketch [3]. The parameters are monitored and only the LED indication is provided to the grower. LED indication alone will not be useful for the grower to monitor the system. Component DescriptionArduino MicrocontrollerArduino is quickly becoming one of the most popular microcontrollers used in robotics. There are many different types of Arduino microcontrollers that differ not only in design and features, but also in size and processing capabilities. There are many features common to all Arduino boards, which make them very versatile. All Arduino boards are based on ATMEL's ATMEGA AVR series microcontroller which features both analog and digital pins. Arduino has also created software that is compatible with all Arduino microcontrollers [3]. Pin Description Pin 1, 2: Connections for standard 32.768 kHz quartz crystal. The internal oscillator circuit is intended for operation with a crystal having a specified load capacitance of 12.5 pF. X1 is the oscillator input and can alternatively be connected to an external 32.768 kHz crystal. The output of the internal oscillator, X2, is shifted if an external oscillator is connected to X1. Pin 3: Battery input for any standard 3V lithium cell or other power source. For proper operation, the battery voltage must be between 2V and 3.5V. Pin 4: This pin is connected to ground. Pin 5: serial data input/output. The input/output for the I2C serial interface is the SDA, which is open drain and requires a pull up resistor, which allows a pull up voltage of up to 5.5V. Regardless of the voltage on VCC. Pin 6: Serial clock input. It is the clock input of the I2C interface and is used in data synchronization. Pin 7: Output Driver/Square Wave. Pin 8: Primary power supply. When the voltage is applied within normal limits, the device is fully accessible and data can be written and read. When backup power is connected to the device and VCC is less than VTP, reading and writing are inhibited. However, at low voltages, the time keeping function still works. The DS1307 real time clock (RTC) integrated circuit is an 8-pin device that uses an I2C interface. The ds1307 is a low-power watch with 56 types of SRAM battery backup. The clock/calendar provides qualified data on seconds, minutes, hours, day, date, month and year. They are available as integrated circuits (ICs) and supervise the timing like a clock and also manage the date like a calendar. The main advantage of RTC is that they have a backup battery that keeps the clock/calendar running even in the event of a power failure. RTC is found in many applications such as embedded systems, computer motherboards, etc. Here the RTC module is used to automatically agitate the tank for an interval of every hour. The RTC is connected by the digital pin of an Arduino microcontroller connected to a DC motor to agitate the tank in both clockwise and counterclockwise directions for well-grown Spirulina species [3]. The sensor was a waterproof stainless steel encapsulated temperature sensor [ 3]. The LM35 is a commonly used type of temperature sensor that can be used to measure temperature with an electrical o/p versus temperature (in °C). It can measure temperature more correctly than a thermistor. This sensor generates a high output voltage compared to thermocouples and may not need the output voltage to be amplified. The LM35 has an output voltage proportional to Celsius temperature. The.