Check this out: http://www.farmersguardian.com/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=19546
I must say, I am incensed.
What do these people (those who resist GM research via illegal activities) think they are accomplishing? Who do they think they are saving? Their activities are unconscionable!
I understand that GMOs still represent a large unknown: how safe are they for human or animal consumption? See my post of May 12 for my previous comments in this regard. These questions must be answered sufficiently, before GM potatoes are offered for consumption.
On the other hand, what is the likelihood that they are dangerous? Even moderately so? Again, let's get real: if what evolutionists say is true, everything on earth is the results of a long GM process, albeit accidental and undirected except for the "survival of the fittest" concept. And driven primarily by radiation-induced mutation, not exactly the most controlled or safe method. Who is to say that that process results in food that is better/safer than GM driven by science toward positive ends? The contrary could be argued with at least some logic behind it.
And what are some of the potential benefits of GM potatoes (and other foods)? They could be resistant to specific diseases (the UK study in the article was aimed at such), enabling potatoes to be grown for food in regions where it is not practical now. They could produce higher yields, effectively lowering the cost so that potatoes could more effectively feed starving nations. They could be bred to store longer, making them available year-round with less investment needed for storage. Sounds like lots of stuff that could benefit the poorest of the world population, no? See UN Year of the Potato info to learn about what potatoes can do for a starving world.
And these self-proclaimed do-gooders not only stand in the way of such progress, they break laws to do so: trespass, vandalism, destruction of property.
I have no patience for these, and neither should society. They should be jailed, fined, made to pay restitution. They should be made to distribute potatoes to starving people, just to see who they are cheating with their despicable actions.
Let's take a close look at GM potatoes, be sure they are safe, but don't let the process be slowed by lawbreaking busybodies!
Tim
Monday, June 30, 2008
GMO Wars
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Warsaw Convention
I am sitting in my hotel room in Warsaw, getting ready for my journey back to Walla Walla, and thought I would jot some notes on the conference that finished last night.
I am referring to the International Potato Processing & Storage Convention that is put on by the people (Crier Media Group) who also issue the magazines Potato Processing International and Potato Storage International. For more details on the conference, click on http://www.potatoconvention.com/.
Warsaw, I think, is a great venue for this kind of function, being well situated in one of the fastest growing regions for potato processing facilities. The city has an impressive Old Town center, the food was quite nice, and the weather could not have been better. I just love dining al fresco, but only in nice weather!
The conference content was quite solid and well-received. I don't intend to try to describe each presentation here, nor do justice to the effort all of the presenters made to get their ideas to us. But I will mention a couple of sessions: Steve Johnson's piece on controlling sprouts with ethylene gas in storage was both enlightening and quite funny (He had an image at the end of two potatoes with sprouts arranged to look like they were hugging- quite clever!).
Some of the statistics on the Ukraine and Russia potato markets and grower situations there, given by David Brenchley who was pinch-hitting for Andriy Yarmak (who couldn't obtain a visa in time) were eye-opening. Scott Valette laid out some of the economic consequences of running dryers at less than optimum. The short story there: by the time you count all the energy costs to remove more water than you should, plus the cost of yield loss incurred by removing that same water, it seems that dryer optimization has huge payback.
Perhaps the surprise hit of the week was Ole Solberg of Hoff Norske Potetindustrier. Ole is a maintenance manager who is down-to-earth, real-world in focus, and yet able to express his thoughts in a way that is both informative and quite entertaining. Ole described his experiences running a French fry line that has no sorter- instead, an ADR 4 is used for the defect control. His results are: very nice yields compared to his previous sorter-only system, and great control of product quality.
I presented a piece on the principles behind such a line layout (using ADR as the primary defect removal device, rather than sorters). At some point soon, I will lay out the concepts of that presentation on this blog site. But the short story is that if your plant encounters incoming strip defect levels over 20% on a regular basis, you really need to consider such a concept. Anything else will carry huge yield and/or productivity costs, or will not produce export-grade product. If you are reading this and want more insight more quickly than I write, please contact me at treardon@key.net for more information.
The one disappointment of the convention was the lack of processors represented. We had some folks from a few such companies, but I was hoping (perhaps, expecting) more of a representation from local processors. They simply did not show up. And, I must say, it was their loss more than mine- I really think that they could have learned some things in this convention that would pay back far beyond the cost and time needed to attend.
And I will also say a bit to the larger potato processing community: I know that there are company secrets out there amongst the big processors that will not be shared in this venue. I recognize that regarding some of the topics presented this week, those companies are completely in-the-know without the convention. But I also am convinced that such time always exposes new thoughts and ideas, and in a relaxed context away from the "quadrant 1" issues, where thought integration can occur. I would strongly encourage you all to consider attending next year's conference on Prince Edward Island (June 23-25, 2009). You will see me there, with more new ideas.
Tim
Friday, June 20, 2008
Foreign Material Control
Check this out:
http://www.potatopro.com/Lists/News/DispForm.aspx?ID=1465&Source=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Epotatopro%2Ecom%2FNews%2Easpx
My guess is that PAS is processing potatoes imported from France or Belgium, where fields still hold quite a few grenades from both major wars of the last century. I have not heard of war on the ground in the UK sufficient to leave many grenades behind. I would think that the grenades would be caught by the rock trap before going further into the line. Question is: how to prevent such significant line downtime to an event that is not as rare as you might expect.
Still, kind of shocking, no?
So, let's get back to our previous subject: How and where to apply lasers in potato plants to control incoming foreign materials (FM): both to prevent line downtime and keep FM out of the product. The latter is driven both by product safety and quality perspectives.
There seem to be two places that make sense: Just upstream of cutting and just prior to packaging.
Let's make sure we're clear: FM is anything other than potato. Anything. That includes a lot of materials: glass, metal and stones comprise some of the worst of it. But also bone, vines/weeds, golf balls and other forms of plastic, various garbage such as beverage containers, worker's paraphernalia such as gloves and ear plus, materials from machines such as fasteners and belting. The list is practically endless.
Priority one is to keep this junk out of the product. Since some of it can be entrained at almost any point in the process, the most logical place to remove it is just prior to packaging, where it can be removed piece by piece instead of removing packages.
So the idea is to place a sorting system that employs lasers in the line just upstream of packaging.
At that point, the system can be multi-functional. If one wished to also remove critical defects to tweak a flow back in grade that has slid out of grade, that seems a benefit. Removal of defect at that point is quite expensive, since so much energy and oil has been spent getting it to packaging. But still perhaps cheaper to remove a few than to face bulking off and blending, with its attendant breakage and other degradation.
Plus, the system could be used to collect length and defect statistics.
The system would need to employ cameras as well as lasers (see comments below from June 9).
More on the pre-cutting location next time.
Tim
P.S. Dave R., Barry R.: Thanks for reading. Post a comment or question once in a while, OK?
Monday, June 16, 2008
Busting the Fluorescence Myth
OK, let's get real.
First, what is fluorescence?
From dictionary.com: "the emission of radiation, esp. of visible light, by a substance during exposure to external radiation, as light or x-rays."
Fluorescence is different than reflection, which is the light by which we see most things. Reflected light is always the same wavelength before as after reflection, if no refraction is involved.
Fluorescence is light generated by an object's surface as a result of the power of the light stimulating the response, but not usually of the same wavelength. Think of the bright glow from your white shirt when under black (UV) lights. The shirt's pigments are stimulated by the UV light, and emit visible (apparently "white") light, even though there are no white lights in the room. Looks kinda magical, no? Many materials/pigments have fluorescent properties, but most are so low in intensity that detection is not possible in processing environments.
Key Technology's "color" sorters have been sorting green peas using fluorescence for more 12 years. Peas (as well as any green seed from the interior of a green pod, like the seeds of string beans) glow bright red under UV light, and even brighter after they are blanched. This is a typical property of chlorophyll, the substance that makes vegetables green. Such a property makes it easy for a "color" sorter to remove everything that is not a good green pea: 1) Make sure that no external red light shines of the product, so the only red light will be fluorescence from good peas; 2) Shine UV light on the peas; 3) Everything that is bright red is a good pea; everything that is not bright red is not a pea, sort it out.
Makes for a nearly perfect sort.
Now take a peek at potatoes. The most common source of fluorescence is again from chlorophyll, from the greening that occurs when potatoes get exposed to sunlight. Laser systems can focus a high concentration of energy on green areas to make them glow quite brightly and so make them distinguishable from.... white potato flesh.
Just like trichromatic cameras have done for years. And all the systems in place for quality control of cut potato products prior to blanching employ cameras.
So what is the benefit of fluorescence in potato applications? None useful, to date. Now, it may be possible to identify some potato fluorescence other than that caused by chlorophyll. Perhaps we will find such a phenomenon where everything that is potato glows one color and everything that is not potato fails to glow in that color.
Until then, we will use cameras for the best possible quality control in cut potato products.
Next time, we will discuss laser applications: Where in a potato plant would you employ lasers?
Tim
Monday, June 9, 2008
Lasers or Cameras or Both
The legend says that lasers are the absolute cure for detection and removal of foreign materials. That they can absolutely detect anything that is not good product, based on some undefined, magical characteristic... "trust us, it 's the truth".
Rubbish!
As the posts below clarify, lasers see things differently than cameras, which allows them to differentiate some materials that look the same to cameras. Or that cannot be reliably imaged with cameras, like clear glass. But some foreign materials look the same as good product to lasers. In those cases, it is very helpful to remove items that are distinguishable by color.
A good example is wood. It's backscattering properties tend to decrease with absorbed moisture, eventually approaching the scatter of potato flesh. How nice in this case to use cameras to separate the wood color from the flesh color of potatoes.
Some plastics also have matching backscatter with good product. So let the cameras remove those pieces that are a different color than good potatoes. And on we go.
Look at the following pairs of images, which contain the same foreign material and potato pieces:
Notice in the first image (laser image on the right, separated by recognized colors on the left), the golf ball look very much different than potato, but the dry wood has some pinkness, getting to be closer to the color of potato. If it were wet, it would be difficult for the laser to distinguish the wood from potato.
In the second image, taken from a vis/IR camera, the light colored wood looks quite similar to potato. But you can imagine the wood being another color, perhaps brown. It would not look different to the laser, only the camera.
Bottom line, to get the best foreign material sort (for potatoes), both laser and camera are recommended.
We will touch on fluorescence next time.
Tim
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
How Laser Sorters Work
So.... if laser sorters are not so accurate in terms of reflected color, what good are they? Why do people commonly use them for controlling product quality? The short answer: they look at things fundamentally differently than cameras. So see how this works, grab your laser pointer, and shine it at piece of metal. What you see is a bright spot. That is the direct laser light reflecting off of the metal. Now shine it against your skin. What you see is the same bright spot (perhaps a bit less bright), PLUS a softly glowing area around the spot, several times the diameter of the bright spot.
Look at the image below, of a laser shining against a piece of steel and a carrot slice. Now look at the same image above. This is how the laser views things: it blocks the bright spot (where you see the black spot) and looks at light reflected from the circle.
A laser system looks at the glowing area around the spot, not at the spot itself. Very translucent objects (including most vegetables) have a relatively bright glow. Many foreign materials, such as metal and most stones, do not glow at all. So, even if they are the same color as the vegetable, the laser sees them as VERY different in translucency. The glow is often called "backscatter".
In this mode, a laser system is effective in identifying most foreign materials that look the same as potatoes to cameras.
So.... what about clear glass?
The laser system also uses a background surface, usually a round bar that the laser shines against when nothing is being sorted. The laser sensors continually look at the translucence of the bar, and compare it with the translucence of each object going by. For most applications, the background bar material is of translucence similar to the good product, so that when a change is sensed, foreign materials are likely present.
Now, when a piece of clear glass (or any other color, for that matter) passes between the laser and the background bar, the laser light is bent as it passes through the glass. This displaces the spot away from the background bar, far enough away from the laser sensors that they see no backscatter at all- the clear glass piece looks black to the laser.
So the laser can see and identify many foreign materials that a camera cannot.
Does this mean that cameras are not valuable for foreign material control?
That will be our next topic.
Tim