MICROBE INVESTIGATION METHOD AND APPARATUS Russian patent published in 2004 - IPC

FIELD: biotechnology, in particular, investigation of food products for determining contamination thereof with pathogenic and other microbes, detecting and/or identification of bacteria and microbes.

SUBSTANCE: method involves producing images of controlled medium containing microbes, exposed to illumination and treated with colorant before and after cultivation in Petri cup; dividing resultant image into three primary colors; calculating chromatic data of histogram, colorimetric characteristic and determining color tints for each primary color; compare resultant data with previously accumulated data by providing similar procedure of dividing image into three primary colors; setting features characteristic for identification of kind of microbes; forecasting multiplication state of microbes under investigation process after cultivation for predetermined time interval, with actual state of microbes under investigation process after termination of microbe cultivation for predetermined time period being taken into account. Apparatus has casing with inlet opening for introducing of Petri cups by means of charging mechanism, round table positioned for rotation in casing and adapted for stacking of fed Petri cups to obtain vertical stack of cups, cup discharge mechanism, device for illuminating and treating of medium with colorant, image generating device, computer with monitor, and mechanism for feeding predetermined number of cups into cassette.

EFFECT: increased precision of investigation owing to increased volume of additionally accumulated specific data for comparing of multiplication state of microbes, and reduced investigation time owing to the possibility for preliminary identification of kind of bacteria and forecasting of microbe multiplication rate.

6 cl, 14 dwg