It sounds like an obvious thing to do, but checking the hygienic quality of milk before it flows into the processing plant is actually quite a difficult and time-consuming task.
If you choose the traditional method, it takes about two days to get to a result. Alternatively, you can invest in some semi-automated analytical equipment solutions, which, while much faster, still involve unwanted handling of chemical reagents.
“Can’t we get an easy, fully- automated method?” This was the very reasonable request that FOSS engineers and scientists knuckled down to address. The result is the new BacSomatic: a small instrument delivering results for two key milk hygiene indicators - bacteria count and somatic cell count. It delivers results within ten minutes and no chemical reagent handling is involved – just place the sample and press start.
Not to take anything away from the design team, but they did have a good head start in the form of some existing analytical technology to be found at the many milk testing laboratories around the world.
