Best Paper Award in 6th IEEE ICKII 2023 - Mr. Ashish Shukla

6th IEEE international Conference on Knowledge Innovation and Invention 2023

Conference website : https://www.ickii.org/

August 11-13, 2023 - Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan

Paper Title: Phygital design of an innovative and portable Autosampler using SMA based mini-actuator for river quality assessment

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Abstract

The evaluation of river water quality is of paramount importance in the maintenance of the well-being and durability of our water reservoirs. While real time sensors can be utilised to analyse various water properties of a river, being able to automatically extract water from a natural setting for controlled laboratory analysis has potential to broaden the scope of research opportunities in terms of quality assurance and range of tests which can be conducted. The present research outlines the proposed conceptual design of a novel and portable submersible autosampler. The Quality Function Deployment (QFD) methodology is utilised to ensure a thorough and methodical approach to the design process. The QFD is employed to determine and rank customer needs, vis a vis currently available auto-sampling technology transforming them into precise design attributes and performance benchmarks. As one of the design solutions, prioritised by QFD on light deployable actuator, we have considered Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) based actuation as a disruptive technology. The proposed device incorporates a NITINOL based SMA spring architecture to effectively draw water samples from rivers via an active syringe. The use of SMA spring based actuation in the submersible autosampler provides various benefits, such as high energy density in a lightweight actuator, superior mechanical strength, and corrosion resistance, in comparison to other existing actuation techniques. The autosampler has the capability to gather a maximum of 10 samples at intervals that can be controlled by the user. It is powered by open-source Arduino hardware and software integrated with the actuator that can be customised by the user to meet the specific deployment needs. This autosampler employs a time triggered sampling methodology by collecting water samples in a syringe and the volume of the sample is determined by the duration of the actuation of the SMA spring. We envisage the integration of the autosampler into our previously designed buoy system which also has the capacity of self-harvesting energy to sustain the monitoring system.