Controlled atmosphere and dynamic controlled atmosphere for Fuzzy logic-based banana storage

Atmosfera controlada e atmosfera controlada dinâmica baseadas em lógica Fuzzy para o armazenamento de bananas

Abstract

The insertion of New Information and Communication Technologies is increasingly present in the most diverse fields of knowledge, among them agriculture. This insertion results in what is called precision agriculture. Postharvest of bananas requires the application of new technologies to increase storage time and reduce losses. Bananas are highly perishable.  Losses in postharvest may vary from 20% to 80% of the crop. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to present the impact of applying new information and communication technologies in the quality and time of conservation of bananas in control atmosphere. To meet the goals, five treatments in the cold storage process of bananas, refrigerated environment, static controlled atmosphere (2% of O2 and 7% of CO2), dynamic controlled atmosphere with static respiratory quotient, dynamic controlled atmosphere with dynamic respiratory quotient, and controlled atmosphere with intelligent control (2% of O2 and 7% of CO2) were applied. These five treatments were implemented based on a computing embedded system, sensors and actuators. The intelligent control system used was built with Fuzzy logic techniques. The system controls the respiration gases of bananas and a cold chamber controls the temperature. To validate the research, the storage of pome banana was evaluated in all the treatments to compare the fruit technical requisites and quality. As results we can see the expressive increase of storage time of bananas with the keep of fruit quality. The treatment system with dynamic and intelligent atmosphere control was also seen (2% of O2 and 7% of CO2) as the most efficient, reaching a storage for 45 days and thus proving that new technologies promotes precision agriculture.