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Fundamentally the process of cooking foodstuffs in
an oven is governed by two key factors: i) temperature
induced protein changes in the foodstuff being cooked,
and ii) controlled moisture loss. Sensing estimation
and control of these two factors through time and as
they vary through the material being cooked is the essential
problem to be solved in autonomous cooking and is the
research focus of this project
The overarching objective of this project is a fully
autonomous system for oven-based cooking: After pre-heating,
an arbitrary fod item is placed in the oven. A combination
of sensors determines food type and quality. Through
a process of sensing and estimation, properties of the
food are continuously monitored. These include surface
and through-material temperature and moisture, mass,
protein and chemical changes. This information is used
to control global and local oven temperatures and oven
moisture removal. Together the sensing, estimation and
control process yields an optimally cooked product every
time.
The research objectives for this project are three-fold:
- To explore and develop appropriate multi-sensor
systems to monitor temperature, foodstuff mass and
moisture content, chemical and protein changes.
- To develop algorithms for on-line estimation and
learning of foodstuff parameters, especially unobserved
internal parameters such as foodstuff structure, temperature
and moisture content.
- To develop oven actuation mechanisms which appropriately
apply knowledge of optimal cooking profiles to measured
or estimated foodstuff values and which uses this
to control through-material temperature and moisture.
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