Plant growing system using portable telephone

• US 8,145,330 B2
• Filed: 02/07/2007
• Issued: 03/27/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 02/07/2006
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Fairy Plant Technology, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Fairy Plant Technology, Inc.
• Inventors: Emoto, Kenji
• Primary Examiner(s): Chaki, Kakali
• Assistant Examiner(s): LAUGHLIN, NATHAN L
• Application Number:
  US12/161,852
• Publication Number:
  US 20090031622A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,875 Days
• Field of Search: 700/17, 700/65, 700/275, 700/284, 47/17
• US Class Current: 700/65
• CPC Class Codes: A01G 7/00 Botany in general
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling

Abstract

A plant growing environment control terminal (P) comprises an image data receiving section (1a) for receiving image data on the image of a plant from a plant growing facility (Q), an image display section (1b) for displaying the plant image according to the received image data, a growing environment data receiving section (1c) for receiving growing environment data, and a growing environment data transmitting section (1f) for transmitting the received growing environment data to the plant growing facility (Q). The end user can grow the plant in his (her) own way while checking the growth progress on the image even from a remote place. Therefore, a plant growing environment control terminal (P) effectively producing generally called healing effect is provided.

Claims

1. A plant growing environment control terminal comprising:

an image receiving section receiving image data from a plant growing facility, the plant growing facility configured to control a growing environment of a plant based on growing environment data for setting or changing the growing environment, and configure to pick up an image of the plant being grown in the growing environment, the growing environment including an irradiation light, a temperature, and a humidity;

an image display section displaying the image of the plant based on the image data received by the image data receiving section;

a growing environment data receiving section receiving the growing environment data;

a growing environment data transmitting section transmitting the growing environment data received by the growing environment data receiving section to the plant growing facility;

a proficiency degree management section for storing a proficiency degree of a user related to growing of the plant,

wherein the higher the proficiency degree of the user is, the more growing environment data the growing environment data receiving section receives that can be manipulated by the user, and

wherein the lower the proficiency degree, the more growing environment data, of the growing environmental data received by the growing environment data transmitting section, is prevented from being changed by the user.

2. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1,

wherein the plant growing environment control terminal is a portable telephone including at least data transmission and reception functions and an image display function.

3. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1,

wherein the image data receiving section can be set to receive the image data automatically and regularly.

4. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1, further comprising:

a transmission-reception status monitoring section monitoring at least one of a reception status of the image data and a transmission status of the growing environment data; and

a notification section notifying that there is a problem with the transmission status or the reception status if the transmission-reception status monitoring section judges that there is the problem with the transmission status or the reception status.

5. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1, further comprising a terminal-side passing time judging section judging whether predetermined time passes since seeding or budding when a setting change command to set or change the growing environment of the plant is received,

wherein if the terminal-side passing time judging section judges that the predetermined time does not pass since the seeding or the budding, the setting change command is made so that the setting change command cannot be received.

6. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1, further comprising a component analysis data receiving section receiving component analysis data on an analysis of components of the plant being grown or having been harvested from the plant growing facility.

7. The plant growing environment control terminal of claim 1 wherein the proficiency degree management section is configured to enable a user to select a proficiency degree and to correspondingly set operational parameters corresponding to the entered proficiency degree for that user during the growth of a plant in a user'"'"'s terminal.

17. The plant growing environment control terminal according to claim 1, wherein the image display section is configured to display harvest age information indicating a number of days necessary from seeding to harvest based on a breed of the plant.

8. A remote plant growing system comprising:

a plant growing facility configured to control a growing environment of a plant based on growing environment data for setting or changing the growing environment, the growing environment including an irradiation light, a temperature, and a humidity; and

a plant growing environment control terminal bidirectionally communicable with the plant growing facility,

wherein the plant growing facility includes

an imaging section picking up an image of the plant being grown;

an image data transmitting section transmitting image data on the image picked up by the imaging section to the plant growing environment control terminal;

a growing environment data receiving section receiving the growing environment data transmitted from the plant growing environment control terminal to correspond to the image data transmitted by the image data transmitting section; and

a growing environment control section controlling the growing environment of the plant corresponding to the image data according to one of the growing environment data received by the growing environment data receiving section and default growing environment data, and

wherein the plant growing environment control terminal includes

an image receiving section receiving the image data from the plant growing facility;

an image display section displaying the image of the plant based on the image data received by the image data receiving section;

a growing environment data receiving section receiving the growing environment data;

a growing environment data transmitting section transmitting the growing environment data received by the growing environment data receiving section to the plant growing facility;

a proficiency degree management section for storing a proficiency degree of a user related to growing of the plant;

wherein the higher the proficiency degree of the user is, the more growing environment data the growing environment data receiving section receives that can be manipulated by the user and

wherein the lower the proficiency degree, the more growing environment data, of the growing environmental data received by the growing environment data transmitting section, is prevented from being changed by the user.

9. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8,

wherein the image data transmitting section can be set to transmit the image data automatically and regularly.

10. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8,

wherein the plant growing facility is used by and shared among a plurality of users so as to grow plants, respectively, and at least the growing environment control section out of the imaging section, the image data transmitting section, the growing environment data receiving section, and the growing environment control section is provided for each of the plurality of users.

11. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8,

wherein the growing environment control section controls at least one of a light illuminating apparatus for controlling the irradiation light, a temperature controller for controlling the temperature, a mist spray device for controlling the humidity, a CO₂ supply device for controlling a CO₂ concentration, and a fertilizer supply device supplying a fertilizer.

12. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8, further comprising:

a growing environment measuring section measuring the growing environment under control of the growing environment control section; and

a growing environment measurement data transmitting section transmitting growing environment measurement data measured by the growing environment measuring section to the terminal.

13. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8,

wherein the growing environment measuring section includes at least one of a light intensity sensor, a temperature sensor, a humidity sensor, a CO₂ concentration sensor, and a fertilizer analysis sensor.

14. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8, further comprising:

a receiving parameter storage section storing receiving parameters for promoting the terminal to receive the growing environment data; and

a receiving parameter transmitting section transmitting the receiving parameters stored in the receiving parameter storage section to the terminal.

15. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8, further comprising a facility time elapse judging section judging whether predetermined time passes since seeding or budding when a setting change command to set or change the growing environment of the plant is received,

wherein if the facility time elapse judging section judges that the predetermined time does not pass since the seeding or the budding, the setting change command is made so that the setting change command cannot be received.

16. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8, further comprising a component analysis data transmitting section transmitting component analysis data on the plant being grown or having been harvested to the terminal.

18. The remote plant growing system according to claim 8,

wherein the growing environment control section controls at least one of a fog generation device generating fog, or a wind generation device producing wind.

19. The remote plant growing system of claim 8, wherein an image of the plant is transmitted to the user at the same time that component analysis data is transmitted to the user and the proficiency degree management section limits the growing environment data that can be altered by the user to enable the user to choose what variables in the growing environment data the user can transmit to the plant growing facility.

20. A plant growing environment control program embodied on a non-transitory computer readable medium for a terminal for causing a computer to function as:

an image receiving section receiving image data from a plant growing facility, the plant growing facility configured to control a growing environment of a plant based on growing environment data for setting or changing the growing environment, and configure to pick up an image of the plant being grown in the growing environment, the growing environment including an irradiation light, a temperature, and a humidity;

an image display section displaying the image of the plant based on the image data received by the image data receiving section;

a growing environment data receiving section receiving the growing environment data;

a growing environment data transmitting section transmitting the growing environment data received by the growing environment data receiving section to the plant growing facility; and

a proficiency degree management section confirming a proficiency degree of a user related to growing of the plant;

wherein the higher the proficiency degree of the user is, the more growing environment data the growing environment data receiving section receives so as to be manipulatable by the user, and

wherein the lower the proficiency degree, the more growing environment data, of the growing environmental data received by the growing environment data transmitting section, is prevented from being changed by the user.