JPH0428351B2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Objective of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to a stirring type culture device for culturing microorganisms, plants, etc. This relates to an agitation-type culture device that performs discharge.

[Conventional technology]

Light may be required for the growth and reaction of microorganisms, plants, etc., and in this case, it is necessary to supply light into the culture tank.

Conventionally, light is supplied into the culture tank by providing a transparent part on a part or the entire side wall of the culture tank, and using this transparent part to irradiate light into the tank from outside the tank.
Alternatively, a shallow culture tank with a transparent part on the ceiling wall may be used, and the transparent part may be used to irradiate light onto the surface of the culture solution in the culture tank from outside the tank. This is carried out by installing a transparent tube, installing a light emitting body such as a fluorescent lamp or a photoconductor such as an optical fiber inside the transparent tube, and irradiating light from the transparent tube into the tank.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

Regardless of whether light is irradiated into the tank from the transparent side wall or ceiling wall of the culture tank, in order for sufficient light to be supplied to the center of the tank or the bottom of the tank, it is necessary to There is a limit to the size of the tank, and it is difficult to uniformly supply light into the culture tank, and as the density of cultured cells, etc. in the culture tank increases, the light transmittance inside the culture tank decreases. This makes it even more difficult to provide uniform light.

For example, in the culture of green algae, as the growth progresses, the light transmittance of the culture solution decreases extremely, and even at a cell density of 2 mg/ml, the light transmittance at a distance of 1 cm is It will be less than 50%. If the light transmittance decreases to such a state, even if the movement of the contents in the culture tank is facilitated by mechanical agitation, it may cause damage to the culture, especially in larger culture tanks. The light supply will be extremely non-uniform.

In a culture tank in which a transparent tube for light emission is arranged, the above-mentioned problems are unlikely to occur, but the structure of the culture tank becomes complicated and special processing is required for the culture tank. In addition, the transparent tube becomes an obstacle that obstructs the flow of the culture solution and culture in the culture tank. In particular, when culturing relatively large and complex plant organs, the culture may become entangled with the transparent tube or the portion of the transparent tube that is fixed to the culture tank, resulting in clumps and growth. This causes a problem in that stirring efficiency and culture efficiency are reduced.

In view of the above-mentioned problems, the present invention aims to uniformly supply light to the contents of a culture tank without interfering with the growth of the culture in the culture tank and without reducing culture efficiency and stirring efficiency. It is an object of the present invention to provide a stirring-type culture device capable of emitting light and capable of responding to an increase in the size of a culture tank.

[Structure of the invention]

[Means for Solving the Problems] According to the present invention, the above-mentioned object is such that a stirring member is rotatably provided in a culture tank, and light is emitted from the stirring member toward the inside of the culture tank. A light emitting section is provided, and a light source for supplying light to the light emitting section is disposed outside the culture tank, and the light source and the light emitting section are connected to a light transmission path including an optical coupling device that is relatively rotatable in the middle. This is achieved by a stirring type culture device such as the one optically connected to. This light conduction path may be constituted by an optical fiber of conventional construction.

Further, in the stirring type culture apparatus as described above, the stirring member has a stirring shaft and a stirring blade attached to the stirring shaft, and the light emitting part is provided on the stirring blade or the stirring blade and the stirring shaft. It's good.

[Effect]

With the above configuration, while the stirring member performs the stirring operation, the stirring member itself irradiates light onto the culture in the culture tank. This allows light to be efficiently supplied even to the inside of the culture tank, which has low light transmittance, and especially when the contents of the culture tank come into contact with the stirring member, light energy is directly applied to the contents. It turns out.

〔Example〕

The invention will now be described in detail by way of example embodiments with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIGS. 1 to 4 show one embodiment of the agitation type culture apparatus according to the present invention. In these figures, 10 indicates a culture tank, and the culture tank 10 is provided with a stirring shaft 12 as a vertical axis so as to be rotatable around its own central axis. A plurality of stirring blades 16 are attached to the portion of the stirring shaft 12 located inside the culture tank 10 by blade attachment members 14 .

The stirring shaft 12 penetrates through the ceiling plate 10a of the culture tank 10 and projects upwardly. At this projecting portion, the stirring shaft 12 is drivingly connected to an electric motor 20 by a belt-type transmission 18, and the electric motor 20 rotates at a predetermined rotational speed. It is designed to be rotationally driven.

The stirring shaft 12 is configured as a hollow shaft, and accommodates a large number of optical fibers 22 in a bundle inside. The optical fiber 22 may have a general structure consisting of a core and a cladding covering the core, all of which are flush with the upper end opening of the stirring shaft 12 with one end surface as the light introduction surface 22a. They are aligned and consistent with each other. The optical fibers 22 extend in the axial direction within the stirring shaft 12 from this end surface portion, are exposed to the outside from the blade attachment members 14 and extend along the blade surface of the stirring blade 16, and have their tip surfaces exposed to the outside. Light emitting surface 22
b. The light emitting surface 22b is the culture tank 1.
It faces the inner circumferential surface of 0.

A coupling sleeve 24 is engaged with the upper end of the stirring shaft 12 . Coupling sleeve 24
are fixedly arranged, and the stirring shaft 12 and the coupling sleeve 24 are in a relationship such that they can rotate relative to each other. One end of a light supply tube 26 is fixedly connected to the coupling sleeve 24 . The light supply tube 26 faces the upper end opening of the stirring shaft 12 at the connecting end thereof with the coupling sleeve 24, and is concentrically spaced apart from the upper end opening of the stirring shaft 12, and has a general structure similar to that of the stirring shaft 12 inside. A plurality of optical fibers 28 are housed in a bundle. All of the optical fibers 28 have one end surface flush with the one end of the light supply tube 26, and the one end surface forms a light supply surface 28a. The light supply surface 28a faces the light introduction surface 22a of the optical fiber 22 within the coupling sleeve 24 with a small distance therebetween. The optical fiber 28 extends in the longitudinal direction within the light supply tube 26 and is connected to a light source 30 so that light can be supplied thereto.

The light source 30 may be an artificial light source such as a halogen lamp, or an appropriate device such as a solar ray concentrator.

According to the above configuration, the light from the light source 30 is transmitted to the light supply surface 28a by the optical fiber 28, and this light is transmitted to the light introduction surface 22a of the optical fiber 22 of the rotating stirring shaft 12. The light is irradiated and transmitted to the optical fiber 22. The light transmitted to the optical fiber 22 is transmitted by the optical fiber 22 to the light emitting surface 22b, which is the distal end surface thereof, and is emitted from this toward the inside of the culture tank 10. Since the light emitting surface 22b of the optical fiber 22 is located on the stirring blade 16, as the stirring blade 16 rotates, the culture tank 1
0, and light is emitted evenly in the circumferential direction of the stirring blade 10.

Incidentally, light is emitted by the optical fiber 22 not only from its tip end surface, but also because, as shown in FIG. Therefore, light may be emitted more scatteringly than in this part.

The light emitting surface 22b of the optical fiber 22 has a first
As shown in the figure, the stirring blades 16 may be provided on all of the stirring blades 16, or as shown in FIG. It may be determined as appropriate depending on the amount of light required for this purpose, the stirring ability of the stirring device, etc.

FIGS. 5 to 8 show another embodiment of the agitation type culture apparatus according to the present invention. In addition, in FIGS. 5 to 8, parts corresponding to FIGS. 1 to 3 are indicated by the same reference numerals as those in FIGS. 1 to 3. In this embodiment, the coupling sleeve 24 is fixedly disposed within the culture tank 10 in a state where it is suspended from the ceiling plate 10a of the culture tank 10 by a hanger rod 34. Accordingly, the stirring shaft 12 extends vertically through the coupling sleeve 24 in the figure, and an optical fiber 28 is disposed in the coupling sleeve 24 in an annular shape around the stirring shaft 12. There is.

The stirring shaft 12 may be constituted by a solid shaft, and an optical fiber 22 is attached to the outer periphery of the shaft in an annular shape. Light introduction surface 22a of optical fiber 22
and the light supply surface 28a of the optical fiber 28 each form an annular shape surrounding the stirring shaft 12 within the coupling sleeve 24, and face each other, thereby directing light from the optical fiber 28 to the optical fiber 22. Communication is taking place.

Therefore, in this embodiment as well, the same functions and effects as in the above-mentioned embodiment can be obtained.

Further, in this embodiment, the lengths of the optical fibers 22 in the stirring blades 16 are different from each other,
The light emitting surfaces 22b are located at different positions in the blade length direction of the stirring blade 16. As a result, the positions of the light emitting surfaces 22b within the culture tank 10 are distributed in the radial direction within the tank, and the uniformity of light supply within the tank is further improved. .

In any of the above-mentioned embodiments, an optical fiber is used as the photoconductor, but in the present invention, the photoconductor is not limited to this. For example, any photoconductive material that can withstand a temperature of about 120°C may be used, and the stirring blade itself may be composed of a porous plate that can emit light, and the photoconductive material may be placed inside this porous plate. good. Further, the light emitting portion may be provided not only on the stirring blade but also on the stirring shaft.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As can be understood from the above explanation, in the stirred culture apparatus according to the present invention, light is supplied from the stirring member itself, which has the highest probability of contacting the contents of the stirring tank per unit time. Furthermore, it becomes possible to uniformly supply light into the culture tank, and even when there are fiber masses of plants in the culture tank, light can be supplied satisfactorily. In addition, the structure of the culture tank is not complicated, the size of the culture tank can be easily increased, and there is no need to place obstacles such as protrusions inside the culture tank. The contents flow smoothly without any problems, and the stirring efficiency does not decrease. Furthermore, by replacing the stirring member, existing culture tanks can be made into light-emitting culture tanks, and existing large-scale culture tanks can be easily converted to light-emitting culture tanks. become.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a longitudinal sectional view showing one embodiment of the agitation type culture apparatus according to the present invention, FIGS. 2 and 3 are sectional views taken along lines - and - of FIG.
The figure is a side view showing an enlarged stirring blade part, FIG. 5 is a vertical cross-sectional view showing another embodiment of the stirring type culture apparatus according to the present invention, and FIGS. 6 and 7 are respectively the same as in FIG. 5. FIG. 8 is a sectional view taken along lines 1 and 2, and FIG. 8 is a side view showing an enlarged stirring blade portion. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 10... Culture tank, 12... Stirring shaft, 16... Stirring blade, 22... Optical fiber, 24... Coupling sleeve, 28... Optical fiber, 30... Light source.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A stirring member is rotatably provided in the culture tank,
The stirring member is provided with a light emitting section that emits light into the culture tank, and a light source that supplies light to the light emitting section is disposed outside the culture tank, and the light source and the light emitting section and an agitation-type culture device characterized in that they are optically connected by a light conduction path that includes an optical coupling device that is relatively rotatable in the middle. 2. The stirring type culture apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the optical conduction path is constituted by an optical fiber. 3. The stirring type culture apparatus according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the stirring member has a stirring shaft and a stirring blade attached to the stirring shaft, and the light emitting section has a stirring blade or a stirring blade and a stirring blade attached to the stirring shaft. A stirring type culture device characterized in that it is provided with a stirring shaft.