Modular Design of Automated Biochemistry Analyzer: Swati Kapoor Vikas Goel
Modular Design of Automated Biochemistry Analyzer: Swati Kapoor Vikas Goel
Modular Design of Automated Biochemistry Analyzer: Swati Kapoor Vikas Goel
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International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887)
Volume 71– No.18, June 2013
4. SYSTEM DESCRIPTION
It consists of light source, homochromy device, colorimetric
cup, temperature sensor, sampling device, photoelectric
converter and microcomputer system and so on. The light
source is a 30W/12V halogen lamp and gives off the steady
Figure 1: Schematic diagram of the sample absorbing white light. The homochromy device is composed of the
monochromatic light rotating wheel, interferential filter and step motor and so on.
A bundle of monochromatic light with intensity Io transmits The step motor drives the rotating wheel where there are 8
through the sample solution with concentration C, and arrives interferential filters distributed proportionally, one of them is
at the photoelectric converter. Suppose the transmitted light a standby and the others are employed for the measurement.
intensity is I, the distance that the light goes across or the light Their wavelengths are 340nm, 405nm, 510nm, 546nm,
pathway is L, then 578nm, 620nm and 670nm separately. The basic block
diagram of the fully automatic biochemistry analyzer
Io/I =eKLC , where K is absorbency (FABCA) is shown in figure 3 below. The system mainly
Thus we can conclude that sample concentration can be constitutes a light source, an optical assembly, a flow cell
measured based on relative change of the transmitted & (where the sample is placed) shown in figure 3, a peltier
incident light intensity provided if the light pathway is fixed. device (to maintain the desired temperature for the performing
According to Lambert and Beer’s law, when monochromatic the particular test on the sample in the flow cell) a filter wheel
light passes through colored solution, the intensity of the assembly, a photodiode, a signal conditioning unit (SCU),
transmitted light decreases exponentially with the increase in analog to digital (ADC), a processing unit which can be
concentration of the absorbing substance. The amount of the interfaced with a display device like LCD, or with a printer or
light energy absorbed depends on the number of molecules keyboard.. The components are discussed in brief below.
present in absorbing material and the thickness of the Keeping in view the low response of photo detector in UV
medium. Thus, intensity of light energy leaving the absorbing (340nm), all the optical components have been provided with
substance is used to provide an indication of concentration of enhanced antireflection coating in the UV region. In the opto-
that particular substance. In this system, the basic requirement mechanical assembly, special care has been taken in the
is to measure optical density/absorbance and the concentration design so that each component is properly aligned with
of the test parameter under run accurately. respect to optical axis. To get the required wavelength of light
to be passed, 6 interference filters of different wavelengths
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International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887)
Volume 71– No.18, June 2013
such as 340nm, 405nm, 505nm, 546nm, 578nm, and 630nm, selected for the test to be carried out on the sample, and then
from UV region to visible region spectrum (300nm to the filter is brought in the front of the flow cell in which the
700nm), have been mounted on the filter wheel sample is placed. Whenever a desired filter for a specific test
is selected, the filter wheel moves from its home position to
the desired position. In this way the desired filter is selected.
The movement of the filter wheel and the placement of the
corresponding filter in front of the flow cell are controlled by
a stepper motor which is programmed through the controller.
The light generated from the halogen lamp then passes
through the sample placed in the flow cell and further passes
through the filter. We have a module that is fitted with the
pair of lenses so as to provide proper pathway to the light. The
light then falls on the photodiode which converts the light into
. an output voltage.
Figure 4: Filters
.
4.2 Photodiode (S13368BQ)
Figure 5: Flow cell in which sample is placed It is also termed as UV enhanced photodiode. The photodiode
is placed in between the signal conditioning unit and the
These filters are selected automatically depending on the test controller. The monochromatic beam of the light that passes
performed. When the filter of required wavelength is selected, from the filter falls on the photodiode where it is converted
the corresponding gain is selected automatically. The filter into a corresponding output voltage to drive the further
wheel is driven by a stepper motor, which is interfaced with circuitry. The main features of this photodiode include:
the port of microcontroller through driver circuit. Pulses are
High sensitivity
generated according to required sequence to rotate the motor
Low capacitance
at required angle, which brings the filter in front of photo
detector. High reliability
This photodiode is primarily used in applications like in
analytical instruments and optical measurement systems
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International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887)
Volume 71– No.18, June 2013
4.4 Analog to digital converter (ADC) The probe is moved down into the test tube to aspirate the
water/sample or reagent. The sampler may have number of
LTC1867 test tube positions depending upon its application and
The LTC1867 is a pin compatible, 8 channel, 12/16 bit A/D requirement. The placement of test tube should be accurate
converter with an internal reference and serial I/O. The and precise enough so that each test tube is at an equal angular
ADC’s typically draw 1.3mA from single 5V supply. The distance from one another. This ensures the proper dipping of
main features of this ADC are: the probe into the selected test tube.
Sample Rate- 200mbps
Automatic nap mode between conversions
8 channel multiplexer with :
Single ended or differential inputs and unipolar and
bipolar conversion modes
Single 5V operation
Signal to noise ratio-89dB
SPI/serial I/O
The main applications where this ADC is used include:
Industrial process control
High speed data acquisition
Battery operated system
Multiplexed data acquisition systems
Imaging systems
As this ADC is housed in narrow and a compact 16 pin- SSOP
package, therefore LTC1867 ADC can be also used in space Figure 10: Automatic biochemistry Analyzer
sensitive as well as low power applications. The automatic
nap mode between conversions also benefits power sensitive
applications. 5. COMPUTATION OF OD
The optical density of the sample is given by:
5. AUTOSAMPLER Optical Density (OD) = 2 - log10(T),
An auto-sampler used in fully automatic bio-chemistry and T is Transmittance given by:
analyzer is an integral part of this instrument. It is an electro- T = It / I 0
mechanical device fitted with different probes to aspirate Where, It is intensity of transmitted light, and Io is the
water, reagents and samples from the test placed in different intensity of the incident light
holes provided in the sampler tray. Each test tube has its T is also computed by the following equations:
unique position and is programmed through the software Say, Vw and Vsample are the voltages with water and sample
section of the unit. The entire sampler unit is attached to respectively.
stepper motor shaft and the position of each test tube is Then T is given by:
controlled via the commands from software section in T = (100 x Vsample/ Vw)
synchronization with different probes. The probes are also
attached to a separate stepper motor shaft. Once a particular RESULTS & CONCLUSION
test is selected the respective test tube comes under the probe. The system is designed using the modular approach. This
enables the system to be used as standalone unit or as an
optical assembly along with sampler system and can be
interfaced with PC or laptop. In that case, the PC/laptop
resources are used in terms of memory, display, keyboard etc.
Further, the limitation on account of memory for result
storage, test storage and sorting of results becomes easier as
the same can be analyzed by using different s/w installed in
the system (PC). However, the PC or laptop needs to be
communicated over a communication channel, serial protocol
is being used in the present case. USB/four wire interface may
Figure 9: Reagent sampler also be employed with necessary modifications in the
software of the same.
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International Journal of Computer Applications (0975 – 8887)
Volume 71– No.18, June 2013
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IJCATM : www.ijcaonline.org