TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates to a transport system with disinfection.

BACKGROUND

The transmission of pathogens such as viruses and bacteria in stores, public rooms, hospitals and other places are costly and at times deadly. Research studies report that pathogens can survive on certain surfaces up to three or even nine days. In some cases, such as that one of hospitals, the bacteria and viruses are known to significantly differ to those found elsewhere and can be resistant to treatments such as antibiotics or conventional disinfectants. In stores and public rooms, where there is a lot of human presence and touching of materials and surfaces, slowing or obstructing the transmission rate of viruses and bacteria requires substantial cleaning and in cases conventional cleaning does not effectively remove or kill the pathogens.

Many viruses and bacteria can lead to severe illnesses and death by infections or diseases. These are transmitted by direct and indirect human contact. For example, like many viruses SARS CoV-2, resulting in the disease COVID-19 are believed to be transmitted by droplets and fluid when an infected person coughs or sneezes, or touches a surface. Research on related coronaviruses shows that the viruses can live for several days on surfaces and items. Similarly, many bacteria can be transmitted through direct or indirect contact with a reservoir of infectious bacteria and they can survive outside of a host and on products and surfaces to remain contagious for extended periods of time.

Significant costs are associated to infections.

The problem with many viruses and bacteria are that many people do not experience symptoms and move in public spaces. In the COVID-19 example, this means that the contagious effects are problematic. U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported about 25% of people infected with the virus may exhibit no symptoms at all. Combined with that many of the viruses and bacteria are highly contagious, the risk is epidemical and pandemic outbreaks.

Efforts to eradicate or remove contaminates such as virus and bacteria from products and materials have varied in applicability and success. Personal hygiene and washing hands with chlorhexidine gluconate and povidone-iodine solutions and distancing from contagious contact points have been advocated, but proven difficult and transmission still occurs. The use of antiseptics in terms of soap, alcohol-based fluid, boric acid, and benzalkonium chloride and iodine are also evident. The problem is that many may be adding to the problem by inducing antibiotic resistance. Moreover, many products and surfaces such as keyboard, touchscreens, or handles are very difficult and almost impossible to sterilize by liquid disinfectants without a negative influence on the electronics that the product is based upon.

Radiation operations, such as using artificial UVC (ultraviolet C), which is a subgroup of ultraviolet light, and is produced by electric lamps, have previously been used for germicidal applications such as sterilization and disinfection. There have been applications of high frequency wave light UVC for decontaminate water, and there has been UVC applications for air sanitation. There have been UVC bulb sanitation solutions for materials and disinfection spaces such as operation rooms. These, however, have not been used for large-scale commercial purposes and fast frequent and optimized cleaning of materials and surfaces in seconds, such as the sanitation of a product in a store. New technology solutions in the LED field makes it possible to sanitize by customizing the wave length for optimizing sterilization of different types of surfaces. This enables large scale usage that the UVC bulbs could not effectively cover because they failed to optimize and reach important wavelength frequencies for sterilization and the technology is not suitable for fast on-and-off UVC light switching. Fast on-off switching is important when sterilizing surfaces such as payment terminals, door key pads or for consumer products. In addition, also advance in LED field also make it possible to miniaturize solutions. A human can use one of these surfaces when for example buying and paying a product and UVC sanitation can occur before the next human uses the device. In this way, UVC sanitation can determinate bacteria and virus from the surfaces before usage by the next customer. The wide use of UVC LED is so far limited, but the recent COVID-19 pandemic and concerns for highly contagious viruses and bacteria supports a strong societal need for cheap and alternative devices. EP2174670B1 presents an automated room sterilizer by measuring reflection of UVC from multiple points within an area. The device can calculate the darkest area in the room and can calculate the dose of UVC for sterilization of the room.

US-A-5891399 describes a device where multiple UVC emitters are used to emit 360-degree radiation and a radiation receiver is sensing the output power of the UVC emitters.

DE-U-29812427 describes a sensor for calculating the cumulative radiation for sterilizing.

SUMMARY

The present disclosure relates to a transport system with disinfection. The system comprises a belt conveyor arrangement arranged to transport objects from a first zone to a second zone The belt conveyor arrangement has side walls separated by a distance suitable for receiving one tray in an upright position. The system further comprises a first sensor arranged to sense presence/absence of a tray and a controller arranged to receive the first sensor signals and to control the belt conveyor arrangement based thereon. The system comprises further a UVC disinfection unit comprising a radiation chamber comprising at least one radiation source arranged to emit UVC radiation to radiate an object present in the radiation chamber. The system further comprises a second sensor arranged in relation to the radiation chamber, wherein the controller is arranged to receive signals from the second sensor and to control emission by the at least one radiation source based thereon to emit radiation when a object is present in the chamber, wherein the UVC disinfection unit comprises a plurality of motorized rollers arranged to drive the objects through the UVC disinfection unit, said motorized rollers being controlled by said controller, and wherein the controller is arranged to control the motorized rollers to drive the objects at a higher speed than speed of transport of the belt conveyor arrangement (111).

As stated above, a controller is arranged to control motorized rollers in the UVC disinfection unit to drive the objects at a higher speed than speed of transport of the belt conveyor arrangement. Therefore, the objects are accelerated at entry into the UVC disinfection unit. The effect of this is that the motorized rollers secure a distance between consecutive objects in the radiation chamber even when the objects during transport before entry into the UVC disinfection unit, are pressuring against each other on the belt conveyor arrangement. The secured distance between consecutive objects secures that it is possible to provide UVC sanitation of the entire objects. This means that a desired level of sanitation can be secured.

The above-described solution for sanitizing of objects in the radiation chamber takes care of the situation where several objects are transported by the belt conveyor side-by-side, perhaps even in contact and possibly pressuring against each other, towards the UVC disinfection unit.

Thus, the system as claimed allows for automatic cleaning of an object after each use in an improved manner so that UVC sanitation is made before the next human uses the object (tray) in an improved way. The set-up secures that the each object gets the same level of sanitation every time.

Further, the set-up also allows for automatic transport of the objects from the first zone of to the second zone.

Optional features are disclosed in the dependent claims.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Figure 1 illustrates schematically a top view of an exemplary check-in security system.

Figure 2 is a block scheme illustrating control of a transport system with disinfection.

Figure 3 is an exploded view illustrating an exemplary transport system with disinfection.

Figure 4 is a perspective view of the exemplary transport system with disinfection of figure 3.

Figure 5 is an exploded view of a driving mechanism of at least some sections of a conveyor belt arrangement of the transport system with disinfection.

Figure 6 is an exploded view of an exemplary UVC disinfection unit of the transport system with disinfection.

Figure 7 is a perspective view of the exemplary UVC disinfection unit of figure 6.

Figure 8 illustrates an example of a radiation source. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Figure 1 illustrates an example of a security check-in system 100 for example for use at airport security check-in.

The check-in security system 100 comprises a transport track 101 arranged to transport trays 103 loaded thereon through a security scan device 102. Persons intending to perform security check-in put their personal belongings on a tray 103 and positions the tray at the transporting track 101 at an entry zone 104 (denoted herein second zone) of the check-in security system. The persons then may walk through a security scan, and when cleared, the persons can pick up the items of the trays at an exit zone 105 (denoted herein first zone) in the transport direction situated after the security scan device. Thus, the entry zone 104 is situated before the security scan device 102 and the exit zone 105 is situated after the security scan device in the transport direction.

The check-in security system further comprises a tray return system 110 for transport of trays from the exit zone (first zone) back to the entry zone 104 (second zone).

Even though a security scan system is disclosed in Figure 1, the invention as disclosed herein is applicable to other types of systems. For example, the security scan device 102 may be substituted with a watering and/or nutrient providing system for application to plants present on the trays. In another example, the tray return system is used as a stand-alone system for transport and disinfection of objects. The distance between the first and the second zones may be very short, for example, when the transport system for disinfection of objects is used as a stand-alone system for UVC cleaning of objects. The objects may for example be packages or trays for transport of any types of items.

The transport system for disinfection 110 will be disclosed more in detail below.

In the illustrated example of figure 1, the transport system 110 is a tray return system for example suitable for trays for personal belongings of an airport check-in security system. The tray return system 110 comprises a belt conveyor arrangement 111 arranged to transport trays from the exit zone 105 of the security check-in system to the entry zone 105 of the security check-in system. The belt conveyor arrangement has sidewalls separated by a distance suitable for receiving one tray. The conveyor belt arrangement may have sidewalls separated by a distance suitable for receiving one tray in an upright position. The conveyor belt arrangement may have sidewalls separated by a distance suitable for receiving one tray in horizontal position. The belt conveyor arrangement 111 receives in the illustrated example trays, which have been transported on the track 102 through the security scan device to the exit zone 105. Characteristically, persons are removing the items (their personal belongings) from the trays

103 within the first, exit zone and place the empty trays in the in the slot of the belt conveyor arrangement formed by the sidewalls. The belt conveyor arrangement 111 runs in the illustrated example substantially in parallel with the track 101. If persons are emptying the trays while facing the track 102, they can dispose the empty tray in the slot formed by the sidewalls of the belt conveyor arrangement 111 running along the extension of the track 102 without moving at all. As stated above, the distance between the sidewalls of the belt conveyor arrangement 111 is preferably selected to receive one empty tray in the slot formed by the sidewalls of the belt conveyor arrangement 111. When the trays are intended to be inserted in the slot in an upright position, the width of the slot corresponds to the height of the tray with a tolerance. The distance between the sidewalls is then characteristically large enough to receive the tray but small enough so that the tray is substantially in the upright position. When the trays are intended to be inserted in the slot in a horizontal position, the width of the slot corresponds to the width or length of the tray with a tolerance.

The belt conveyor arrangement 111 has along at least a part of its extension a driving mechanism for driving the belt conveyor arrangement. This will be described more in detail later.

A first sensor 113 is arranged to sense presence/absence of a tray. In the illustrated example, the first sensor 113 is mounted at the belt conveyor arrangement 111 at the second (entry) zone

104 of the check-in security system.

The first sensor 113 is for example a presence or proximity sensor. The proximity sensor is a sensor able to detect presence of nearby objects without any physical contact. The proximity sensor is for example a capacitive proximity sensor, a photoelectric sensor or an inductive proximity sensor. The presence sensor is able to detect presence with or without physical contact. The presence sensor comprises for example a mechanical or light-sensitive switch. The first sensor may be laser based.

A controller is arranged to receive the first sensor signals and to control the driving mechanism based thereon. If the first sensor 113 does not detect presence of a tray at the entry zone the controller is arranged to control the driving mechanism of the belt conveyor arrangement to transport any trays carried by the belt conveyor arrangement in a direction towards the second (entry) zone. In an example, the controller is arranged to control the driving mechanism to stop the belt conveyor arrangement 111 in response to detection of presence by the first sensor. Thus, the controller secures that a tray is present at the second (entry) zone of the system while driving stops when presence of a tray is detected. If trays are removed from the belt conveyor arrangement at the second (entry zone), the driving is continued until removal of trays stops and the first sensor detects presence of a tray.

The tray return system 110 comprises further a UVC disinfection unit 99. The UVC disinfection unit comprises a radiation chamber 112 arranged along the extension of the belt conveyor arrangement. The radiation chamber 112 comprising at least one radiation source arranged to emit UVC radiation to radiate a tray present in the radiation chamber 112.

A second sensor 114 is arranged in relation to the radiation chamber 112. The second sensor is for example arranged in the transport path before the radiation chamber. The second sensor is for example arranged at the outside of or inside the radiation chamber. The second sensor may be directed along the extension of the transport path to monitor an approaching tray.

For example, the second sensor may comprise an imaging device such as a camera. The imaging device may be arranged in relation to the belt conveyor arrangement to obtain a plurality of images of the tray as the tray is travelling along the belt conveyor arrangement.

Characteristically, the controller is arranged to receive signals from the second sensor and to control emission by the at least one UVC radiation source based thereon to emit radiation only when a tray is present in the radiation chamber. For example, the controller may be arranged to predict a timing when the tray is in position for radiation based on images captured by the imaging device and to control emission by the at least one radiation source based thereon. The imaging device may be positioned within the radiation chamber or in the transport path before the UVC disinfection unit 99.

The UVC disinfection unit comprises further a driving mechanism for driving trays through the UVC disinfection unit 99. This will be described more in detail later.

Figure 2 illustrates a system for control of the operation of a transport system for disinfection, such as the tray return system 110 of the security check-in system described in relation to figure 1. The control system comprises a controller 115 arranged to receive sensor data relating to signals from a first sensor 113 and a second sensor 114. The first sensor 113 is arranged to sense presence of an object at an end part (first zone) of the belt conveyor arrangement. The second sensor is arranged to detect when an object is in position in a radiation chamber of a UVC disinfection unit for radiation by means of the radiation source(s) as discussed more in detail herein. The controller controls a driving mechanism 117 of the belt conveyor arrangement, a drive mechanism 98 of the UVC disinfection unit 99 and radiation source(s) of the radiation chamber 112 as discussed in relation to figure 1.

In different embodiments, the controller is arranged to control the driving mechanism of the UVC disinfection unit 99 to drive the objects at a higher speed than speed of transport provided by the corresponding driving mechanism 117 of the belt conveyor arrangement (111).

Figures 3 and 4 illustrate an exemplary transport system 110 with disinfection. The transport system with disinfection may comprise the features as disclosed in relation to figure 1 and or figure 2. In the illustrated example, a belt conveyor arrangement 111 of the transport system 110 with disinfection comprises a plurality belt conveyor sections Illa, 111b, 111c. The number of belt conveyor sections can be selected to provide a desired length of the system. For example, the number of belt conveyor sections may be chosen to match the extension of a security checkin system. Thus, the number of belt conveyor sections can be selected so that one end of the belt conveyor arrangement extends to a location suitable for picking up object (suck as trays) for example for use in scanning items by the security check-in system and the other end of the belt conveyor arrangement extends to a location suitable for leaving used objects (such as trays) for example by persons picking up their items from the trays. It is at least in the security check- in application of importance that the belt conveyor arrangement is located such that there is no effort for the persons walking through the security check-in system pick up and leave trays.

Each belt conveyor section Illa, 111b, 111c comprises two sidewalls 118a, 118b, 118c extending from a bottom arranged to convey the objects.

In the exploded view of Fig 3 only one of the sidewalls 118 of the belt conveyor arrangement is illustrated.

In the illustrated example, the objects exemplified as trays 103 are positioned upright with their longest side (length) extending substantially vertically. However, the trays can also be positioned upright in the transport system with their shortest side (width) extending substantially vertically. Alternatively, the trays can also be positioned horizontally positioned in the transport system 110 with the bottom of the tray resting at the bottom the belt conveyor arrangement.

The transport system 110 with disinfection comprises further a UVC disinfection unit 99. In the illustrated example, the UVC disinfection unit is interposed between conveyor belt sections.

The UVC disinfection unit 99 comprises a radiation chamber 112. The radiation chamber 112 has along its sidewalls radiation sources.

The bottom of the UVC disinfection unit 99 has a driving mechanism which is characteristically formed as continuation of the belt conveyor arrangement to obtain the conveying properties to transport the trays through the radiation clamber.

The UVC disinfection unit 99 will be described more in detail later. In figure 5, an exploded view of a driving mechanism 117 formed at at least one section of the conveyor belt arrangement 111 of the transport system 110 is illustrated. The driving belt mechanism 117 drives the belt conveyor to transport trays from the exit region 105 to the entry region 104. The driving belt mechanism comprises in the illustrated example a belt conveyor 120 comprising a conveyor belt 119 and driving means 121 for driving the conveyor belt 119.

In detail, the exemplified belt conveyor 120 comprises in the illustrated example two or more pulleys. The conveyor belt 119 is arranged to rotate about the pulleys in an endless loop. At least one of the pulleys is powered. The powered pulley(s) may be denoted as drive pulley(s). Any unpowered pulley may be referred to as idler pulley(s). The conveyor belt 119 is moving in the endless lope as long as the pulleys rotate. It should be noted that the belt conveyor having at least one powered pulleys is only given as an example. The belt conveyor can have any type of driving means such as a drive chain.

Other driving mechanisms 117 than a belt conveyor are known in the art and can be substituted with the herein described.

Figures 6 and 7 illustrates details of an exemplified UVC disinfection unit 99 of the transport system with disinfection as disclosed herein.

In figure 6 it is illustrated that wherein the at least one UVC radiation source 116 comprises at least one radiation source arranged at one sidewall 95 of the radiation chamber. Characteristically, the at least one UVC radiation source comprises at least one radiation source arranged at each sidewall 95 of the radiation chamber. Preferably, at least one UVC radiation source arranged at a bottom and/or upper wall of the UVC disinfection unit is arranged to emit radiation into the radiation chamber. Thereby, it is achieved a 360° disinfection of the object radiated within the radiation chamber.

Further, at least some of the walls within the radiation chamber may have reflector plates with a UVC radiation reflecting coating. Thereby, the radiation provided by the UVC radiation sources is evenly distributed in the radiation chamber

The UVC disinfection unit 99 comprises a driving mechanism 98 arranged to drive the objects through the UVC disinfection unit. In the illustrated example, the driving mechanism 98 comprises a plurality of motorized rollers arranged to drive the objects through the UVC disinfection unit, said motorized rollers being controlled by said controller. By using rollers instead of a transport band as in the belt conveyor arrangement within the UVC disinfection unit, a significant part of the UVC radiation from UVC radiation sources at the bottom wall of the UVC disinfection unit reaches the radiation chamber between the rollers, thereby improving 360° disinfection of the tray within the radiation chamber.

The controller may as discussed above be arranged to control the driving mechanism of the UVC disinfection unit 99 to drive the objects at a higher speed than speed of transport provided by the corresponding driving mechanism 117 of the belt conveyor arrangement (111). Thereby, it is secured that a distance between consecutive objects is provided and thereby it is secured that walls of trays are properly radiated.

Further, a third sensor may be mounted within the radiation chamber, said third sensor being arranged to detect a UVC level within the radiation chamber. Thereby it can be secured that the level of radiation is at a desired level during radiation. If the radiation level is below a threshold, the controller may be arranged to provide an alarm to an operator.

In the illustrated example, the illustrated sidewall 95 is provided with a plurality of elongated openings 122 through which the radiation sources 116 are arranged to emit radiation into the interior of the radiation chamber. The other, opposite sidewall may also be provided with a plurality of elongated openings 122 through which the radiation sources 116 are arranged to emit radiation into the interior of the radiation chamber. Further, also an upper wall of the radiation chamber may be provided with a plurality of elongated openings 122 through which the radiation sources 116 are arranged to emit radiation into the interior of the radiation chamber. Further, the bottom of the radiation chamber 112 may also be provided radiation sources 116 arranged to emit radiation into the interior of the radiation chamber.

In practice, each radiation source comprises preferably at least one printed circuit board or chip provided with a plurality of UVC LEDs.

Due to the illustrated configuration, the radiation chamber 112 characteristically contains a majority of the UVC radiation therein. In the illustrated example, the UVC disinfection unit comprises a deflection plate 96 arranged at the opening and exit to the radiation chamber to thereby prevent substantial parts of the UVC radiation from reaching the environment outside the radiation chamber.

Figure 8 illustrates an example wherein a radiation source 116 comprises a printed circuit board or chip 16 with a plurality of LEDs 13 mounted thereon. The driver circuit of the radiation source 116 is not shown in this figure.