FOOD & AGRICULTURE

Gelatin content in a particular food sometimes would trigger insecurity and hesitation to consume it. Muslims consumer especially very concern with the halal status of the food. So, here my proposal idea to tackle with this issue by developing a food scanner that would detect any gelatin composition in a particular food. The overview of the design of the scanner is shown below:

Features:

• Equipped with near-infrared (NIR) sensor
• Easy to carry everywhere
• Pocket-size scanner
• Low-cost sensors

How does it work?

The core of this mobile scanner is comprises with a near-infrared (NIR) sensor that identifies the amount and composition of gelatin content presence in the homogenous food. The infrared light is beamed with high precision at the product to be investigated enable the scanner measures the spectrum of the reflected light. The absorbed wavelengths would allow us to make inferences about the chemical composition of the food. 

    Next, the scan results of the food would appear and display on the scanner's screen. The user would immediately know either the foods contain gelation or not. The scanner also send a copy of measured data of the food to an app to store and reference to the user. In addition, the consumer is given other brands as an alternative ways for that food products. However, this gelatin-free scanner system also limited. It can only evaluate the gelatin content of homogeneous foods. At present, it struggles to inspect heterogeneous products containing variety and different ingredients such as pizza.

Community Impact:

Gelatin-free scanner is highly potential to help food organizations or food industry community to ensure the safe contents of food without gelatin. They can get the results in a short period of time and immediately decide to purchase or not. We should be a smart consumer. People will confidently buy the food without any hesitations and also food industry community would committed to prepare and serve healthy yet safe foods for their customers. 

Collaboration:

A teamwork and collaboration with Department of Veterinary Services, Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industries would contribute a successful to this project. This department would provide a data or compositions of the animal gelatins for our team to work on the suitable wavelength that detected by the sensors.