January 12, 2007

German RFID project tracks meat freshness using lasers

A team of German researchers is developing a system that uses laser beams to recognise and record the freshness of meat from the slaughterhouse to the supermarket.

The three-year FreshScan project is currently in the conceptual phase and would develop as a two-component system.

The first is a semi-active RFID tag with temperature sensors to continually record the condition of the meat as it is distributed along the supply chain. The second is an RFID reader with an optical detector using a laser beam that would analyse and record the condition of the meat as documented in the tag.

What sets it apart from normal systems is that the reader measures the light spectrum in which chemical changes can be detected, said Rolf Thomasius, a researcher from Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Micro-integration (IZM),

The institute aims to create a prototype so the system can be implemented shortly after the research ends, Thomasius said.

The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) has provided the institute with EUR3 million for the project.