Design of a Simple Fuzzy Logic Control for Food Processing

The main objectives of the food process control are to maintain food safety, quality assurance, less processing time, and high production at minimum cost (Linko And Linko (1998). In the food industry, end-products must achieve a compromise between several properties, including sensory, sanitary and technological properties. Among the latter, sensory and sanitary properties are essential because they influence consumer choice and preference. Advanced process control techniques have been widely applied in the chemical, petrochemical and forest-based industries, after the apparently first computer-aided process control system was installed in 1959 in an oil refinery in Port Arthur, Texas (Johnson (1996), Anderson et al. 1994). In general, computerized control systems in the food industry have been recently comprehensively discussed Mittal (1997). There is no doubt that advanced, intelligent control techniques such as model-based, expert, neuro-fuzzy and hybrid control systems would offer particular advantages also in food and allied processes (Caro and Morgan(1991). Investments in automation, robotics, and advanced control techniques are likely to result in marked savings in costs, increased productivity, improved and more consistent product quality, and increased safety8. (Linko And Linko (1998).