Artificial intelligence laundry treatment apparatus

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11423302-B2
Application number	US-201916497782-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Jun 13, 2019
Priority date	Jun 13, 2019
Publication date	Aug 23, 2022
Grant date	Aug 23, 2022

Abstract

An artificial intelligent laundry treatment apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention includes: a door including an external cover and an internal glass and configured to open and close a laundry entrance; a gasket formed on an inner circumferential surface of the laundry entrance; a door imaging sensor disposed to face the internal glass and configured to acquire a door image; a gasket imaging sensor configured to acquire a gasket image including a region of the gasket; and a processor configured to classify a state of the door on the basis of the door image, to acquire a gasket contamination degree on the basis of the gasket image, and to determine whether inside cleansing is required for a region including an inside of a drum on the basis of at least one of the classification result of the state of the door or the acquired gasket contamination degree.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A laundry treatment apparatus comprising:
a door including an external cover and an internal glass and configured to open and close a laundry entrance;
a gasket formed on an inner circumferential surface of the laundry entrance;
a door imaging sensor disposed to face the internal glass and configured to acquire a door image;
a gasket imaging sensor configured to acquire a gasket image including a region of the gasket; and
a processor configured to classify a state of the door on the basis of the door image, to acquire a gasket contamination degree on the basis of the gasket image, and to determine whether inside cleansing is required for a region including an inside of a drum on the basis of at least one of the classification result of the state of the door or the acquired gasket contamination degree.

2. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising a memory configured to store a classification model, which is learned using a deep learning algorithm, for classifying the state of the door from the door image.

3. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 2 , wherein the processor inputs the door image as input data of the classification model, and
acquires the classification result based on at least one characteristic point extracted from a region corresponding to the internal glass of the door image from the classification model.

4. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 3 , further comprising a learning processor configured to update the classification model on the basis of the door image or the at least one characteristic point, and the classification result.

5. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the door imaging sensor is disposed in a space between the external cover and the internal glass.

6. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising a memory storing a reference gasket image,
wherein the processor performs image subtraction between a gasket image acquired from the gasket imaging sensor and the reference gasket image,
calculates an area of a contaminant existence region of the acquired gasket image on the basis of the image subtraction result, and
acquires the gasket contamination degree on the basis of the calculated area.

7. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 6 , the larger the calculated area, the more the gasket contamination degree increases.

8. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the gasket imaging sensor is disposed on the inner circumferential surface of the laundry entrance.

9. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , further comprising at least one light source disposed on the inner circumferential surface of the laundry entrance,
wherein the processor turns on the at least one light source when acquiring the door image or the gasket image.

10. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor controls the door imaging sensor to acquire the door image when a washing operation of the laundry treatment apparatus is not performed.

11. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 10 , wherein the processor controls the door imaging sensor to acquire the door image after a predetermined time passes from end of the washing operation.

12. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor controls the gasket imaging sensor to acquire the gasket image with the door open.

13. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor controls at least one of a display or a speaker to output an inside cleansing notice when determining that inside cleansing is required.

14. The laundry treatment apparatus of claim 1 , wherein the processor controls a communication unit to transmit an inside cleansing notice to a server or a user's terminal when determining that inside cleansing is required.

Assignees

• Lg Electronics Inc

Inventors

• Kim Jinok
• PARK Yunsik
• Hwang Sungmok

Classifications

• D06F33/43 Primary

  Control of cleaning or disinfection of washing machine parts, e.g. of tubs · CPC title

• G06V20/20

  in augmented reality scenes · CPC title

• G06V10/764

  using classification, e.g. of video objects · CPC title

• G06N3/08 Primary

  Learning methods · CPC title

• G06F18/241

  relating to the classification model, e.g. parametric or non-parametric approaches · CPC title