Photonics for Food

Enabling agri-food industry transformation

The event is free of charge! This event will be held in English!

In cooperation with our partner Food Tech Platform we organize this webinar for finding new opportunities for developing the agri-food industry through the use of photonics.

Digitalization of the agri-food industry is underway and driven by new tech, of which photonics is a key enabling technology. Photonics provide opportunities throughout the whole food value chain, such as more efficient greenhouse growing, quality monitoring, sanitizing, traceability and many more. The potential of photonics in food industry is constantly growing as new applications and challenges are found to be solved.

This webinar brings together food and photonics companies and experts to discuss new photonics solutions and new opportunities suitable for the use of photonics in the food industry. Join us, hear, and discuss the added value that this growing branch of technology can bring to the food industry.

As a conversation starter check out a fact sheet coauthored by Photonics Finland and Food Tech Platform: Let’s talk about Photonics and food production

Registration for the webinar is open until 19th of November 2020 at the following link

For any questions contact PhD Ana Gebejes (ana.gebejes@photonics.fi; +358414760113)

Program

1:00-1:15	Webinar introduction and housekeeping   Food Tech Platform Introduction Laura Forsman, Program Leader for Food Tech Platform Finland, University of Turku Photonics Finland Introduction PhD Ana Gebejes, Head of Projects at Photonics Finland
1:15-1:30	‘Photonics in digitalized agrifood ecosystem‘   PhD Heikki Aro R&D Manager (PhD, Food Chemistry), HKScan Corporation, Finland   HKScan is building a new model to its value chain, in particular to its contract production. The new model enables HKScan to correspond to the current market demand better than before. The new model will primarily address new consumer and customer expectations related to sustainability and transparency, while also striving to improve the productivity of the entire value chain. HKScan will invite various companies to take part in developing the ecosystem from fields such as field cultivation practices and crop production, feeding, new energy solutions, transport and logistics. The sophisticated photonics technology and corresponding digital tools are potential instruments to be part of this development.
1:30-1:45	‘Energy efficient LED grow lights controlled by plants and AI‘ PhD Mikko Tikkanen Assistant professor, University of Turku, Business Finland L-LED project, Finland   Due to the global change indoor farming by artificial light is expected to revolutionize the food production during the next decades. Indoor farming is based on conversion of electricity into light by photonic devises (LEDs) and collection of this energy by the most important photonic system of nature: the photosynthetic machinery. Energy efficient use of LEDs requires continuous communication between the LED light and the photosynthetic machinery. L-LED combines the latest photosynthesis knowledge, AI and LED and sensor technologies to create new highly energy-efficient lighting systems for indoor farming.
1:45-2:00	‘Application of photonics in crop growth and quality control in the food production chain‘ Professor Markku Keinänen Research manager, University of Eastern Finland, Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, Finland   Spectromics Laboratory Description of non-invasive optical approaches in monitoring plant growth and quality control in the context of food production. Examples of cultivation of crop plants in the field, greenhouse production, post-harvest processes, storage conditions and applications at the production line for quality control and sorting.
2:00-2:15	‘Why should you now consider spectral imaging for agri-food applications?‘   PhD Pavel Paclik Director, perClass BV , The Netherlands   Spectral imaging enables a broad range of applications in agri-food that cannot be handled by classical machine vision. In this presentation we will show examples of use-cases that can now be addressed. We will discuss what are the latest developments that make this technology practically applicable. We will explain how domain experts and system integrators can build their own solutions without machine learning expertise and without programming. Finally, we will show how the solutions can be integrated and deployed in production using standard-compliant components.
2:15-2:35	‘Case Flavoria® research restaurant and bio waste monitoring‘ Pauliina Ojansivu Research Coordinator at Flavoria® research platform, Finland   Minna Lapinlahti-Aaltonen Product Specialist ESCflow|Quality Support, Process & Energy, Elomatic Oy, Finland   Flavoria® is a multidisciplinary research platform for producing new scientific knowledge and consumer understanding for the sustainable development of the society and businesses. It is located at Medisiina D, in the center of Turku University´s campus area. Flavoria® has 3 research contexts: a lunch restaurant, a café and a multisensory lab. Its current technologies enable daily measuring of food choices and bio waste by applying scales. Bio waste monitoring has been carried out with Elomatic by modifying Elomatic´s ESCflow solution.   Challenge to photonics: How could machine vision take Flavoria’s research solutions or ESCflow to the next level? Can we improve research methods’ accessibility and individual control over own data but not compromise data security and reliability through new technological solutions?
2:35-2:55	Q&A with audience
2:55-3:00	Closing

Webinar Materials

Find Food Tech Platform Introduction slides here
Find Photonics Finland Introduction slides here
Find Professor Markku Keinänen’s slides here
Find PhD Pavel Paclik’s slides here
Find Pauliina Ojansivu’s and Minna Lapinlahti-Aaltonen’s slides here