Manitoba Rural Adaptation Council

A Pinawa, Man. company is hoping its new optical technology will have a significant impact on the wheat industry’s fight against fusarium.

Spectrum Scientific began researching the plant-infecting fungal disease approximately eight years ago and in 2007 applied to the Manitoba Rural Adaptation Council (MRAC) for funding to build a pilot-scale demonstration prototype of a technology that will be able to separate fusarium damaged kernels (FDK) from sound grain.

“The funding was quite critical. This research could not have happened without it,” says Dr. David Prystupa, president of Spectrum Scientific.

“Grain fungi have a significant economic impact in Manitoba,” he adds, noting fusarium costs the Canadian wheat industry between $80 million and $100 million annually, and 30 to 50 per cent of the wheat samples in Manitoba have fusarium, which affects the grade of the wheat.

This project fit into Pillar II – Capturing Market Opportunities by Advancing Research Results of the Advancing Canadian Agriculture and Agri-Food (ACAAF) program, which was funded by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and ended in March 2009.

Prystupa says the focus of the project is to make the cost of the detector as inexpensive as possible without sacrificing the performance.

The current detector is not large enough to be commercial as it can only process one tonne of wheat per hour, he notes, adding, the goal is to produce a detector that has the capacity to process 20 tonnes per hour.

“We need to make it bigger for it to be commercially useful,” he says.

Prystupa’s intent is for this detector to be mobile and used by farmers or grain elevators. He feels there’s much demand among wheat producers for the technology.

Spectrum Scientific is currently on the fast track to obtaining a Canadian patent for the optical technology and has also applied for patents around the world.

In a related MRAC-funded project, the research and development company is also focusing on the emissions that come from the FDK when it’s burned, says Prystupa. The hope is that the results of this research will create a market for the FDK and satisfy environmental concerns. Prystupa has already discovered that the FDK can be used as a fuel but it has to be burned in a suitable furnace.   

For more information on Spectrum Scientific visit www.spcsci.com.

~ Teresa Falk, MRAC Communications Officer

Photo: The back view of the one tonne per hour K-max prototype. The grain is fed into the central bin and is processed by three banks of detectors (two on the reverse side). The FDK exits via the chute at the side. Photo courtesy Spectrum Scientific.