Drone-based microbial analysis system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9447448-B1
Application number	US-201514744663-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Jun 19, 2015
Priority date	Apr 15, 2015
Publication date	Sep 20, 2016
Grant date	Sep 20, 2016

Abstract

A drone-based microbial analysis system includes an electronic drone control facility including an electronic storage memory device. The storage memory device stores information including a location of at least one possible contaminated area previously determined to contain at least one positively-tested microbe. At least one drone vehicle is in signal communication with the drone control facility and autonomously navigates to the at least one possible contaminated area to collect a specimen. The drone control facility performs a microbial analysis based on the collected specimen and confirms the at least one possible contaminated area is a positively contaminated area that contains at least one microbe based on the microbial analysis.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of performing a microbial analysis, the method comprising:
determining at least one possible contaminated area;
autonomously navigating at least one drone vehicle to the at least one possible contaminated area to collect at least one specimen;
performing a microbial analysis based on the collected at least one specimen; and
confirming the at least one possible contaminated area is a positively contaminated area that contains at least one microbe based on the microbial analysis.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising performing at least one decontamination operation to decontaminate the positively contaminated area in response to determining that the at least one possible contaminated area tests positive.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising transmitting location data indicating the at least one possible contaminated area to the at least one drone vehicle such that the drone vehicle autonomously navigates to the at least one possible contaminated area.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the at least one drone vehicle autonomously returns to the electronic drone control facility in response to collecting at least one specimen to deliver the collected at least one specimen.

5. The method of claim 4 , further comprising performing the microbial analysis on the at least one specimen delivered by the at least one drone vehicle.

6. The method of claim 5 , further comprising transmitting specimen data to the electronic drone control facility.

7. The method of claim 6 , further comprising performing the microbial analysis based on at least one of the delivered specimens and the transmitted specimen data.

8. The method of claim 1 , further comprising generating a lookup table (LUT) populated with the at least one possible contaminated area previously determined to contain at least one positively-tested microbe and updating the LUT in based on a result of the microbial analysis.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Kozloski James R
• Lynar Timothy M
• Pickover Clifford A
• Wagner John M

Classifications

• B64U2201/10

  autonomous, i.e. by navigating independently from ground or air stations, e.g. by using inertial navigation systems [INS] · CPC title

• B64U2101/00

  UAVs specially adapted for particular uses or applications · CPC title

• C12Q1/04 Primary

  Determining presence or kind of microorganism; Use of selective media for testing antibiotics or bacteriocides; Compositions containing a chemical indicator therefor {(C12Q1/6897 takes precedence)} · CPC title

• B64C39/024

  of the remote controlled vehicle type, i.e. RPV · CPC title

• B64C2201/141

  Operations & Transport · mapped topic