Patent ID: 7771988

Claim:
A control device for a fermenter comprising: an input device for connecting to the fermenter for entering shape data of the fermenter; means for generating mesh data from shape data of the fermenter, shape data of impellers of the fermenter, operating conditions of the fermenter, and initial value data; a measurement unit for connecting to the fermenter, in which biomass is cultured while oxygen gas is blown into a culture medium and the culture medium is stirred, for measuring nutrient components, a concentration of oxygen, a concentration of carbon dioxide, and a concentration of biomass in the culture medium; a processor programmed to calculate a nutrient components uptake rate, an oxygen uptake rate and a carbon dioxide exhaust rate per unit amount of biomass from the data measured by the measurement unit, as well as a volumetric mass transfer coefficient kLa from turbulent energy k calculated by a transport equation for the turbulent energy, and a turbulent energy dissipation rate e calculated by the transport equation for the turbulent energy dissipation rate, as well as a diffusion coefficient D, and programmed to calculate the concentrations of the nutrient components, dissolved oxygen, and dissolved carbon dioxide in any area in the fermenter using an algorithm to numerically integrate a transport equation that is a differential equation describing variations in medium components over time from the calculated nutrient components uptake rate, the calculated oxygen uptake rate, the calculated carbon dioxide exhaust rate, and the calculated volumetric mass transfer coefficient kLa; and means for displaying concentration distributions of the nutrient components, dissolved oxygen, and dissolved carbon dioxide in the fermenter based on the concentrations of the nutrient components, dissolved oxygen, and carbon dioxide in any area of the fermenter calculated by the processor.