2010 International Conference on Industrial Electronics, Control and Robotics

Design a Colour Sensor: Application to Robot

Handling Radiation Work
Sanjib Sahu ∗ , Padmalaya Lenka2, Swati Kumari2, K. B. Sahu , Biswajit Mallick ,
1 3 1

Institute of Physics, Bhubaneswar, India

1

Department of Electrical & Electronics Engg., Spintronic Technology & Advance Research,
2

Bhubaneswar, India
3
Department of Mechanical Engg., Spintronic Technology & Advance Research, Bhubaneswar, India

colour sensor is developed with a array of LDRs, where the

Why a new type of Robot for radiation Environment is biasing voltage is very less compared to APD based colour
required? sensor. This sensor is used in a micro-controller based robotic
arm and successfully able to distinguish 8 colors. This can be
enhanced to 256 colors. This work is the first developmental
During the course of operation of nuclear power plant or stage of the robot, which will be used for alignment of the
nuclear reactor a person become highly radioactive and must sample sensing laser of different colour in high-dose radiation
eventually be stored as hazardous waste, so, robots are usually
preferred for handling the nuclear power plants and
dismantling nuclear weapons. Also, high radiation dose is
dangerous to the human health. To overcome these difficulties
a number of Robots has been developed in different place:
Remote surveillance squad (RESQ) & radiation-proof robot
(RaBOT) - Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute (JERI)
[1].
New generation of radiation robots (medical application) - Los
Alamos National Laboratory [2]. environment (External beam line).
Automated technology for new generation of radiation robot -
Alamos National Laboratory [3].
First human-like robot to space (Robonaut 2, or R2) -
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and
General Motors, USA [4].

I. INTRODUCTION

This paper describes the outline of the development of the

colour sensor meant for the radiation-robot used for the
alignment of sample for various experiments in a radiation
environment near nuclear beam line of 3MV Tandem pelletron
Accelerator at Institute of Physics, Bubaneswar. In this paper
a comparative study between the APD and LDR for their
sensitivity towards different colours also discussed. A cost
effective as well as with reasonable accuracy and precision, a
∗
Corresponding author: S. Sahu, Institute of Physics, Bhubaneswar, India;
phone: +919437301863; e-mail: sahusanjib69@ gmail.com.
978-1-4244-8546-8/10/$26.00 ©2010 IEEE
Fig. 1 Tandem Palletron Accelerator, Institute of
Physics, Bhubaneswar, India (Top- Machine,
bottom-External Beam line)
II. PRINCIPLE
This sensor is designed with the principle of light
dependency of a LDR. The variation of resistance of a LDR is
wide ranged compare to APD current variation for a particular
biasing voltage. In this project an effort is made to calibrate
LDR's photo sensitivity with different biasing voltage and that
also compared with the APD data, where the minimum biasing
77
voltage required is quite high. The characteristics curve is IV. R ESULTS
given for different baising voltage and it is observed the
biasing voltage doesn't make much change in sensitivity of the 9
LDR resistance with different colorsr. The optimum sensitivity
observed at 12V biasing. The LDR is connected as a voltage 8
divider network and the output of this network is given to a
signal conditioning section which is a subtractor to limit the 7
output within 0-5V.The ADC value is taken into the micro- r
u

controller and compare with the predefined data to check the o

l
o
C 6
color and accordingly the controller take the decision to
control the robot. 5

4
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
O u tp u t v o lta g e (e V )

Fig. 2Fig.
Flow4 chart
Outputofvoltage vs. sensor
the colour colour code
The values for different colours are: blue (4.38 V), black
(4.54V), red (5.54V), no 4 (7.23V), no 6 (7.80V), no1
(7.80V), no5 (7.88V), no2 (7.96V) yellow (8.07V), no3 ,

(8.16V), no7 (8.26V) white (8.54V), and no8 (8.64V). Sensing

to the different colour laser for alignment of sample in
radiation environment is reported in the paper. In the second
part we are planning to detect the various high energetic
radiation, ion beams and alignment of the sample to the exact
beam direction with high accuracy.
V. C ONCLUSION
III. PERATION
O

The present research project is based on the development of

In operation point of view, design part is classified into
two parts, first is to design the colour radiation sensor and
second is to interface the sensor with a microcontroller. This
robot is deigned to detect different color radiations and act
accordingly. The Ultrasonic distance sensor designed with 40
Khz sound signal bust detects the obstacle if the obstacle is
with in the specified limit then the controller starts scanning
the sensor. The LDR of colour sensor generate different
voltage by the voltage divider network. After processing the
signal that is feed to a 8-bit ADC and the controller is written
with a fuzzy based algorithm to compare the signal with a pre
defined standard table and recognize the color. After
recognizing the colour the controller issue control signal to the
driving motor of the robot to perform the specific pre-defined
assignment.
a robot extensively meant for the alignment of experimental
sample in radiation environment. Since the high energetic
nuclear radiation is hazardous to health, so a special type of
radiation robot being planned to design to meet the above
requirement, while carryout the experiment using nuclear beam
line / external beam line experiments in the institution
R EFERENCES
[1] Oka Kiyoshi, “Remote controlled work of radiation-proof robot,” Sci. of
Mach.., vol. 57, no. 6, pp. 641–649, 2005.
[2] J. Mesina. (2010, May 25). Super accurate radiation robot kill cancer
cells and leave healthy ones untouched. Available:
http://www.physorg.com/news194014523.html.
[3] T. J. Beugelsdijk, and D. W. Knobeloch “Robots in radiation
environments,” J. Liq. Chromato. Rel. Technol.., vol. 9, no. 14, pp.
3093–3131, 1986.
[4] A. Kauderer (2010, June 24). NASA to lunch human-like robot to join
space station crew. Available:
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/technology/features/robonaut.html

Fig. 3 Colour sensor carrying Robot

78