Tag: Processing.org

Low Cost Microcontroller-based Digital Microfluidics using “Processing”

Posted by JonathanCline – July 1, 2009

I’ve now tested the digital microfluidics board via microcontroller. The digital microfluidics board moves a liquid droplet via Electrowetting-on-Dielectric (EWOD).  The microcontroller switches the high voltage via a switching board (pictured below, using Panasonic PhotoMOS chips), which controls the +930VDC output by the HVPS (posted earlier), and runs over USB using no cost Processing.org software.  This is alpha stage testing.. cleaner version to be built.  The goal of course is to scale the hardware to allow automation of microbiology protocols.

Labview is quite expensive, and industrial-grade high voltage switching boards are also quite expensive.  So I built my own hardware and the Processing.org language is an easy way to test things.  The Processing.org language is a free, open source graphics/media/IO layer on top of Java (as posted previously here).

What follows is the super simple test software written in Processing.org & Java.

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Analog Data Acquisition from USB Microcontroller using the “Processing” Language

Posted by JonathanCline – March 25, 2009

Building on the previous two mini-projects, I have a mini-graphical data acquisition project now running under the Processing language, getting real-world signals from the USB microcontroller (which is a Microchip PIC on a UBW Board from Sparkfun).  Source code below the screenshot.

USB microcontroller sends data to Processing application, which graphs the data

USB microcontroller sends data to Processing application, which graphs the data

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Blinky LED ‘Hello World’ using USB Microcontroller in ‘Processing’

Posted by JonathanCline – March 24, 2009

Every good embedded systems hardware project begins with a blinking LED (or toggling level as seen on the oscilloscope).  In Processing.org language, there’s the opportunity for both, since the built-in graphics allow for data display as well as the USB microcontroller interface.  (There’s several Processing projects for Arduino, BTW.)   Source code is below.

USB Microcontroller blinks happily under Processing.org program

USB Microcontroller blinks happily under Processing.org program

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Using the Processing.org Language with Microcontrollers

Posted by JonathanCline – March 22, 2009

Media-technology engineers at MIT have created a computer language and easy-to-use runtime environment called Processing, hosted at processing.org.  I wrote a small code snip for accessing the PIC microcontroller from a USB port, using Processing; it’s pasted below.

This PIC microcontroller connects to USB on a PC, Mac, or Linux machine

This PIC microcontroller connects to USB on a PC, Mac, or Linux machine

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