Unpowered delivery device and system

Abstract

The present invention discloses a non-powered conveying device, which comprises a transmission unit, a plurality of stoppers, and a control device. According to the design of the present invention, the length of the front supporting leg of the transmission unit is greater than that of the rear supporting leg, so that the transmission unit presents a situation of high front end and low rear end. With this design, at least one sterile tissue culture box placed on the transmission unit will naturally slide to the rear end of the transmission unit, thereby non-poweredly completing the conveying of the sterile tissue culture box. Moreover, the control device can control the stoppers to rise to block the natural sliding of the sterile tissue culture box. In the case that the sterile tissue culture box stops sliding, a tissue culture operation can be performed on the sterile tissue culture box manually or by using a mechanical arm.

Description

[0001] Technical Field: This invention relates to the technical field of aseptic tissue culture box delivery devices, and more particularly to a non-powered delivery device and system. Background technology:

[0002] Plant tissue culture is a technique that separates certain cells or tissues from the parent plant and cultivates them under appropriate conditions to enable them to grow, develop, differentiate, and proliferate. The principle stems from the totipotency of plant cells, meaning that a specific type of cell within a plant can independently develop and differentiate into a complete adult plant.

[0003] Operators familiar with plant tissue culture (commonly known in the industry as "tissue culture") will know that the tissue culture process includes the following steps:

[0004] (1) Prepare a sterile tissue culture box and inject the culture medium (nutrient solution) into the sterile tissue culture box;

[0005] (2) Place the sterile tissue culture box into the cold storage room and wait for the culture medium to solidify;

[0006] (3) Take a tissue section of the plant and place it into the sterile tissue culture box;

[0007] (4) Seal the sterile tissue culture box; and

[0008] (5) Transfer the sterile tissue culture box to await the next stage of seedling cultivation and packaging.

[0009] When performing the aforementioned steps (1) to (5), manual execution is relied upon step by step without the assistance of automated equipment, resulting in a persistent inability to increase the production capacity of tissue culture. Alternatively, even if automated equipment from other fields is introduced, it may cause further disruptions to the tissue culture process due to its non-dedicated nature. For example, the lack of baffles during transport may cause the process to pause, hindering tissue culture operations; or, if unexpected stops occur during transport, there is no effective mechanism to resume transport. Therefore, it is necessary to design automated devices for plant tissue culture to make the entire tissue culture process more efficient and thereby increase production capacity.

[0010] For the reasons mentioned above, the creator of this invention has devoted considerable effort to research and development, and has finally completed the development of a non-powered conveying device and system. Summary of the Invention:

[0011] The main purpose of the present application is to provide a kind of unpowered conveying device and system, comprising: a transmission unit, a plurality of baffle and a control device.According to the design of the present application, the length of the front support foot of the transmission unit is greater than the length of its rear support foot, so that the transmission unit presents the situation of high front end and low rear end. According to this design, at least one sterile tissue culture box placed on the transmission unit will naturally slide to the rear end of the transmission unit, thereby unpoweredly completing the conveying of the sterile tissue culture box. And the control device can control the baffle to rise to block the natural sliding of the sterile tissue culture box. In the case of stopping sliding of the sterile tissue culture box, a tissue culture operation can be performed on the sterile tissue culture box manually or by using a mechanical arm, wherein the tissue culture operation includes the steps of opening the cover, injecting the culture medium, cooling the culture medium, placing the tissue section, spraying the disinfection spray and sealing the cover.

[0012] To achieve the above purpose, the present application proposes an embodiment of the unpowered conveying device, comprising:

[0013] a transmission unit, comprising: a setting frame, K transmission wheels arranged on the setting frame, at least one front support foot supported on the front end of the setting frame, and at least one rear support foot supported on the rear end of the setting frame, wherein K is a positive integer;

[0014] a blocking unit, comprising: L baffles and a baffle lifting mechanism, wherein L is a positive integer, and the L baffles are equidistantly arranged between the K transmission wheels; and

[0015] a control device electrically connected to the baffle lifting mechanism;

[0016] wherein the control device controls the baffle lifting mechanism to lift / lower at least one baffle;

[0017] wherein the length of the front support foot is greater than the length of the rear support foot, so that at least one sterile tissue culture box placed on the transmission unit will naturally slide to the rear end of the transmission unit under the condition that the L baffles are all lowered, thereby unpoweredly completing the conveying of the sterile tissue culture box.

[0018] In an embodiment, the sensor is any one selected from the group consisting of rotary optical encoder, Hall effect type speed sensor and angle sensor.

[0019] In an embodiment, wherein the transmission wheel is integrated with a flexible pressure sensor coupled to the control device, such that the control device receives a pressure sensing signal from the flexible pressure sensor, thereby determining whether the sterile culture box is located on the transmission wheel based on the pressure sensing signal.

[0020] In an embodiment, wherein the aforementioned unpowered conveying device of the present application further comprises:

[0021] J driving motors, wherein each of the driving motors is connected to a main shaft of one of the transmission wheels, and J is a positive integer; and

[0022] K sensors, wherein each of the sensors is connected to the main shaft of one of the transmission wheels, and is configured to sense a rotation information of the transmission wheel, and the rotation information comprises a rotation distance;

[0023] wherein, after the baffle lowering mechanism lowers one of the baffles to block the natural sliding of one of the sterile culture boxes, the control device determines whether at least one of the transmission wheels located below the sterile culture box is rotated based on the rotation distance, and in the case that the aforementioned transmission wheel is not rotated, the control device controls the driving motor to rotate the transmission wheel.

[0024] In an embodiment, wherein the driving motor is selected from the group consisting of a stepper motor, a servo motor, and a brushless direct current (BLDC) motor.

[0025] In an embodiment, wherein the aforementioned unpowered conveying device of the present application further comprises:

[0026] L robotic arms, which are equidistantly arranged on one side of the setting rack, and are electrically connected to the control device;

[0027] L cooling devices, which are equidistantly arranged above the setting rack, and are electrically connected to the control device; and

[0028] L sterilization spraying devices, which are equidistantly arranged above the setting rack, and are electrically connected to the control device;

[0029] wherein, in the case that one of the sterile culture boxes is blocked by one of the baffles and stops natural sliding, the control device controls one of the robotic arms, one of the cooling devices, and one of the sterilization spraying devices to perform a culture operation on the sterile culture box.

[0030] In an embodiment, wherein the culture operation comprises the following steps:

[0031] (1) Open one of the sealed lids of the sterile tissue culture box;

[0032] (2) Inject a culture medium into the sterile tissue culture box;

[0033] (3) Cool the culture medium to solidify it;

[0034] (4) Take a plant tissue slice and place it into the sterile tissue culture box;

[0035] (5) Spray disinfection of the inside of the sterile tissue culture box; and

[0036] (6) Take the sealing cap and seal the sterile tissue culture box.

[0037] Furthermore, the present invention also proposes a non-powered conveying system, comprising:

[0038] A frame with a accommodating space;

[0039] A plurality of the unpowered conveying devices of the present invention as described above are disposed within the accommodating space and arranged regularly in a certain arrangement; and

[0040] At least one temperature and humidity sensor is disposed within the accommodating space.

[0041] In one embodiment, the arrangement is any of the following: single-line horizontal arrangement, multi-line horizontal arrangement, single-line stacked arrangement, multi-line stacked arrangement, single-line horizontal arrangement combined with single-line stacked arrangement, or multi-line horizontal arrangement combined with multi-line stacked arrangement.

[0042] In a feasible embodiment, the aforementioned unpowered conveying system of the present invention further includes at least five isolation plates for isolating dust, bacteria and viruses, which are attached to the left, right, front, rear and top sides of the frame to make the accommodating space a sterile space. Attached image description:

[0043] Figure 1 This is a perspective view of a first embodiment of a non-powered conveying device according to the present invention;

[0044] Figure 2 This is a partially exploded view of a first embodiment of the unpowered conveying device of the present invention;

[0045] Figure 3 for Figure 1 The side view of the transmission unit shown;

[0046] Figure 4 for Figure 1 The block diagram shown is of the unpowered conveying device of the present invention.

[0047] Figure 5 Figure 1 is a first perspective view of a first embodiment of a non-powered conveying device according to the present application;

[0048] Figure 6 Figure 2 is a second perspective view of the first embodiment of the non-powered conveying device according to the present application;

[0049] Figure 7 Figure 3 is a first perspective view of a first embodiment of a non-powered conveying system according to the present application; and

[0050] Figure 8 Figure 4 is a second perspective view of the first embodiment of the non-powered conveying system according to the present application.

[0051] Reference Signs:

[0052] 1: non-powered conveying device

[0053] 11: transmission unit

[0054] 111: setting stand

[0055] 112: transmission wheel

[0056] 113: front support leg

[0057] 114: rear support leg

[0058] 12: sensor

[0059] 13: drive motor

[0060] 141: baffle

[0061] 142: baffle lifting mechanism

[0062] 15: control device

[0063] 16: flexible pressure sensing sheet

[0064] 17: robot arm

[0065] 18: cooling device

[0066] 2: non-powered conveying system

[0067] 21: frame

[0068] 211: spacer DETAILED DESCRIPTION:

[0069] In order to more clearly describe the non-powered conveying device and system according to the present application, a preferred embodiment of the present application will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

[0070] Non-powered conveying device (first embodiment)

[0071] Figure 1A perspective view of a first embodiment of a non-powered conveying device of the present invention, and Figure 2 A partial exploded view of the first embodiment of the non-powered conveying device of the present invention. As shown in Figure 1 Figure 2 The non-powered conveying device 1 of the present invention mainly comprises a transmission unit 11, a blocking unit, and a control device 15, wherein the transmission unit 11 comprises a setting frame 111, K transmission wheels 112 arranged on the setting frame 111, at least one front supporting leg 113 supported on the front end of the setting frame 111, and at least one rear supporting leg 114 supported on the rear end of the setting frame 111, wherein K is a positive integer. Further, Figure 3 A side view of the transmission unit 11 as shown in Figure 1 In particular, the present invention designs the length of the front supporting leg 113 to be greater than the length of the rear supporting leg 114, so that the transmission unit 11 presents a situation of high front end and low rear end. With this design, at least one sterile tissue culture box placed on the transmission unit 11 will naturally slide to the rear end of the transmission unit 11, thereby non-poweredly completing the conveying of the sterile tissue culture box.

[0072] As shown in Figure 1 Figure 3 In the structure of the non-powered conveying device 1 of the present invention, the blocking unit comprises L baffles 141 and a baffle lifting mechanism, wherein L is a positive integer, and the L baffles 141 are equidistantly arranged between the K transmission wheels 112. On the other hand, the control device 15 is electrically connected to the baffle lifting mechanism 142. Further, Figure 4 A block diagram of the non-powered conveying device 1 of the present invention as shown in Figure 1 As shown in Figure 1 , Figure 3 Figure 4 The control device 15 can control the baffle lifting mechanism 142 to lift / lower at least one of the baffles 141. In the case of lifting the baffle 141 to block the sliding of the sterile tissue culture box, a tissue culture operation can be performed on the sterile tissue culture box manually.

[0073] More specifically, the tissue culture operation comprises the following steps:

[0074] (1) opening a sealed cover of the sterile tissue culture box;

[0075] (2) injecting a culture medium into the sterile tissue culture box;

[0076] (3) cooling the culture medium to solidify it;

[0077] (4) placing a plant tissue slice into the sterile tissue culture box; ​​​

[0078] (5) spray disinfecting the inside of the sterile culture box; and

[0079] (6) sealing the sterile culture box with the sealing cover.

[0080] Generally, after completing step (6), the baffle 141 will be lowered to remove the blockage to the sterile culture box, so that the sterile culture box can continue to slide naturally. However, due to friction, the sterile culture box can no longer slide naturally, in which case a pushing force must be applied to the sterile culture box or the driving wheel 112 must be controlled to rotate, so that the sterile culture box can continue to slide forward on the driving unit 11. For the foregoing reasons, as shown in Figure 1 、 Figure 2 and Figure 4 , the present application integrates a flexible pressure sensor 16 coupled to the control device 15 in each of the driving wheels 112, and additionally provides K sensors 12 and J driving motors 13 in the structure of the non-powered conveying device 1, where J is a positive integer.

[0081] In more detail, the control device 15 is electrically connected to the baffle lifting mechanism 142, the driving motor 13, and the K sensors 12. The control device 15 receives a pressure sensing signal from the flexible pressure sensor 16, so as to determine whether the sterile culture box is located on the driving wheel 112 by means of the pressure sensing signal. Moreover, each of the driving motors 13 is connected to a main shaft of one of the driving wheels 112, and each of the sensors 12 is connected to the main shaft of one of the driving wheels 112, so as to sense a rotation information of the driving wheel 112 and transmit it to the control device 15. Generally, the rotation information includes rotation distance, rotation speed, etc. In an embodiment, the driving motor 13 can be a stepper motor, a servo motor, or a brushless direct current (BLDC) motor. Moreover, the sensor 12 can be a rotary optical encoder, a Hall effect type rotation speed sensor, or an angle sensor.

[0082] According to this design, after the baffle lifting mechanism 142 lowers the specified baffle 141, the sterile culture box is no longer blocked by the baffle 141, so it can continue to slide naturally. At this time, the control device 15 determines whether at least one of the driving wheels 112 located below the sterile culture box is rotating by means of the rotation distance, and if it is not rotating, it indicates that the sterile culture box has not slid. Therefore, in the case where the aforementioned driving wheel 112 does not rotate, the control device 15 controls the driving motor 13 to drive the driving wheel 112 to rotate, thereby restarting the sterile culture box to slide forward on the driving unit 11.

[0083] Non-powered conveying device (second embodiment)

[0084] Figure 5 , Figure 6 These are first and second perspective views of a second embodiment of a non-powered conveying device according to the present invention. Figure 5 and Figure 6 As shown, the second embodiment of the unpowered conveying device 1 of the present invention mainly includes: a transmission unit 11, K sensors 12, J drive motors 13, a blocking unit, a control device 15, L robotic arms 17, L cooling devices 18, and L disinfection spray devices, where L is a positive integer. According to the design of the present invention, the L robotic arms 17 are equidistantly arranged on one side of the mounting frame 111 and electrically connected to the control device 15. On the other hand, the cooling devices 18 are equidistantly arranged above the mounting frame 111 and electrically connected to the control device 15. Furthermore, the L disinfection spray devices are equidistantly arranged above the mounting frame 111 and electrically connected to the control device 15.

[0085] According to this design, when a sterile tissue culture box stops sliding naturally due to being blocked by a baffle 141, the control device 15 controls a robotic arm 17, a cooling device 18, and a disinfection spray device to perform a tissue culture operation on the sterile tissue culture box, the tissue culture operation including steps (1) to (6) as described above. In other words, when the transmission unit 11 is placed with at least one sterile tissue culture box for performing the tissue culture operation, the sterile tissue culture box can slide slowly forward on the transmission unit 11 without power because the transmission unit 11 has an incline. Furthermore, because the transmission wheel 112 integrates a flexible pressure sensing pad 16, the control device 15 can determine which transmission wheel 112 the sterile tissue culture box has moved onto after receiving the pressure sensing signal transmitted by each flexible pressure sensing pad 16. When the sterile tissue culture box approaches the baffle 141, the control device 15 controls the baffle lifting mechanism 142 to raise the designated baffle 141, thereby blocking and stopping the sliding of the sterile tissue culture box. Then, the control device 15 controls a robotic arm 17, a cooling device 18, and a disinfection spray device to perform a tissue culture operation on the sterile tissue culture box.

[0086] When the operation of the tissue culture in this stage is completed, the control device 15 controls the baffle lifting mechanism 142 to lower the designated baffle 141, so that the sterile tissue culture box can continue to move forward to the next stage (i.e. the next baffle 141). In this way, at each stage, the baffle 141 is raised or lowered to complete the operation of the entire automatic production line. In each stage, the tissue culture operation including the above-mentioned operations of opening the cover, injecting the culture medium, cooling the culture medium, placing the tissue slice, spraying the disinfectant spray, and sealing the cover is performed.

[0087] Unpowered conveying system

[0088] Figure 7 A first perspective view of an unpowered conveying system according to the present application. As shown in Figure 7 , the unpowered conveying device 2 according to the present application mainly comprises a frame 21 having a receiving space, a plurality of unpowered conveying devices 1 according to the present application as described above, and at least one temperature and humidity sensor arranged in the receiving space. According to the design of the present application, the plurality of unpowered conveying devices 1 are arranged in the receiving space and arranged in a regular arrangement. In possible embodiments, the arrangement can be single-line horizontal arrangement, multi-line horizontal arrangement, single-line stacked arrangement, multi-line stacked arrangement, single-line horizontal arrangement combined with single-line stacked arrangement, or multi-line horizontal arrangement combined with multi-line stacked arrangement. It should be understood that when single-line or multi-line stacked arrangement is used, racks can be used in combination.

[0089] Continuing to refer to Figure 7 , and referring to Figure 8 , which is a second perspective view of the unpowered conveying system according to the present application. As shown in Figure 7 and Figure 8 , an isolation sheet 211 can be installed on the left side, right side, front side, back side, and upper side of the frame 21 to isolate dust, bacteria, and viruses, so that the receiving space of the frame 21 becomes a sterile space. In possible embodiments, the isolation sheet 211 can be made of acrylic or melt-blown non-woven fabric with filtering effect. Furthermore, a temperature and humidity sensor can be additionally arranged in the receiving space (i.e. the sterile space) of the frame 21, so that a suitable ecological environment for tissue culture is formed in the sterile space.

[0090] Thus, the unpowered conveying device and system according to the present application have been completely and clearly described above. However, it must be emphasized that the above detailed description is a specific description of possible embodiments of the present application, and the embodiments are not intended to limit the scope of the claims of the present application. Any equivalent implementation or modification made without departing from the spirit of the present application should be included in the scope of the claims of the present application.

Claims

1. A passive delivery device, characterized in that, The application relates to a sterile tissue culture box conveying device, comprising: a transmission unit, including a setting frame, K transmission wheels arranged on the setting frame, at least one front supporting leg supported on the front end of the setting frame, and at least one rear supporting leg supported on the rear end of the setting frame, wherein K is a positive integer; a blocking unit, including L baffles and a baffle lifting mechanism, wherein L is a positive integer, and the L baffles are equidistantly arranged between the K transmission wheels; and a control device electrically connected to the baffle lifting mechanism; wherein the control device controls the baffle lifting mechanism to lift / lower at least one baffle; wherein the length of the front supporting leg is greater than the length of the rear supporting leg, so that at least one sterile tissue culture box placed on the transmission unit can naturally slide to the rear end of the transmission unit when the L baffles are all lowered, thereby achieving the conveying of the sterile tissue culture box without power; further comprising J driving motors, wherein each driving motor is a main shaft connected to one transmission wheel, and J is a positive integer; and K sensors, wherein each sensor is connected to the main shaft of one transmission wheel to sense a rotation information of the transmission wheel, and the rotation information includes a rotation distance; wherein the control device is electrically connected to the baffle lifting mechanism, the driving motors and the K sensors, and receives the rotation information from the sensors; wherein after the baffle lifting mechanism lowers a baffle to block the natural sliding of one sterile tissue culture box, the control device judges whether at least one transmission wheel under the sterile tissue culture box rotates by the rotation distance, so that when the transmission wheel does not rotate, the control device controls the driving motor to drive the transmission wheel to rotate. The sensor is selected from any one of a group consisting of a rotary optical encoder, a Hall effect type rotation speed sensor and an angle sensor. The transmission wheel is integrated with a flexible pressure sensing sheet coupled to the control device, so that the control device receives a pressure sensing signal from the flexible pressure sensing sheet, thereby judging whether the sterile tissue culture box is located on the transmission wheel by the pressure sensing signal. The driving motor is selected from any one of a group consisting of a stepping motor, a servo motor and a brushless direct current motor. Further comprising: L mechanical arms equidistantly arranged on one side of the setting frame and electrically connected to the control device; L cooling devices equidistantly arranged above the setting frame and electrically connected to the control device; and L sterilization spraying devices equidistantly arranged above the setting frame and electrically connected to the control device; wherein when one sterile tissue culture box is blocked by one baffle and stops naturally sliding, the control device controls one mechanical arm, one cooling device and one sterilization spraying device to perform a tissue culture operation on the sterile tissue culture box. The tissue culture operation comprises the following steps: (1) opening a sealed cover of the sterile tissue culture box; (2) injecting a culture medium into the sterile tissue culture box; ​ ​ ​ ​ 2. The unpowered delivery device of claim 1, wherein, ​ 3. The unpowered delivery device of claim 1, wherein, ​ 4. The unpowered delivery device of claim 1, wherein, ​ 5. The unpowered delivery device of claim 1, wherein, ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ 6. The unpowered delivery device of claim 5, wherein, ​ ​ ​ (3) cooling the culture medium to solidify it; (4) placing a plant tissue section into the sterile culture box; (5) spraying the inside of the sterile culture box with sterilizing agent; and (6) sealing the sterile culture box with the sealing cover.

7. A passive delivery system characterized by, The frame has a receiving space. A plurality of the unpowered transport devices as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 6 are arranged in the receiving space in a regular arrangement; and at least one temperature and humidity sensor is arranged in the receiving space. The regular arrangement is any one of the following: single-line horizontal arrangement, multi-line horizontal arrangement, single-line stacked arrangement, multi-line stacked arrangement, single-line horizontal arrangement combined with single-line stacked arrangement, or multi-line horizontal arrangement combined with multi-line stacked arrangement.

8. The unpowered delivery system of claim 7, wherein, The unpowered transport device further comprises at least five isolation sheets for isolating dust, bacteria and viruses, which are combined to the left side, right side, front side, back side and upper side of the frame, so that the receiving space becomes a sterile space.

9. The unpowered delivery system of claim 7, wherein, The unpowered transport device further comprises at least five isolation sheets for isolating dust, bacteria and viruses, which are combined to the left side, right side, front side, back side and upper side of the frame, so that the receiving space becomes a sterile space.

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