CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of Chinese Patent Application No. 201910741990.7 filed on Aug. 12, 2019 in the State Intellectual Property Office of China, the whole disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.

TECHNICAL FIELD

Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to a detection system adapted to detect a specific gas in a container, and in particular to a sampling probe adapted to detect a specific gas in a container, an automatic sampling device comprising the sampling probe, and a container detection system comprising the sampling probe.

BACKGROUND

Currently, radiation imaging technology has been widely used in the security inspection of large containers, especially for the detection of high-density substances in the containers that render radiation intensity to have a significant attenuation. However, it is difficult for the radiation imaging technology to detect and identify low atomic number and low density substances such as toxic and harmful gases, fumigants, high-flammable gases, trace drugs, explosives, and the like in containers. On the other hand, photoionization, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, microbalance, surface acoustic wave, and combined gas chromatography-ion mobility spectroscopy technique are very suitable for the detection of toxic and harmful gases, chemical warfare agents and high-flammable gases.

A hazardous chemical detection system has been developed. The hazardous chemical detection system is equipped with at least two sampling intake points on a fixed mounting frame to extract odor molecules volatilized from hazardous chemicals in the container, and then respectively carries ion migration detector, biosensor and nanowire chain reaction sensor to detect hazardous chemicals. However, on the one hand, due to the relatively sealed container body, volatile samples can only spread out from the container door seam and container ventilator, and the volatile amount is limited; on the other hand, the mounting frame is far away from the container, and the toxic and harmful gas/hazardous chemical samples volatilized outside the container will be diluted quickly after combining with the air outside the container, so the collected samples are difficult to represent the actual conditions of the samples inside the container, the detection error is high, and it is easy to produce false negatives.

In addition, a container gas detection device has also been developed. When detecting toxic and harmful gases/hazardous chemicals in the container, the operator holds the sampling probe and inserts the sampling probe from a door seam of the container to suction and sample. On the one hand, the sampling is cumbersome and not intelligent, and may cause harm to the operator; on the other hand, forcibly sampling at the door seam of the container may damage the sampling probe or deteriorate the waterproof performance of the container.

SUMMARY

The purpose of the present disclosure is to solve at least one aspect of the above-mentioned problems and defects existing in the prior art.

According to an embodiment of one aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a sampling probe, comprising: a mounting base; a housing mounted on the mounting base, a first accommodation chamber having an opening being defined in the housing, and an exhaust hole in communication with the first accommodation chamber and outside of the housing being formed in the housing; a coupling portion formed on an outer edge of the opening of the first accommodation chamber and formed to be hermetically coupled with an air outlet of a container; and a suction device mounted on the housing and configured to suck gas in the container into the first accommodation chamber through the air outlet.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the housing comprises: an outer housing mounted on the mounting base, the suction device being mounted on the outer housing; an inner housing mounted in the outer housing; and a sealing material disposed between the outer housing and the inner housing, wherein the outer housing, the inner housing and the sealing material are provided to define a second accommodation chamber in communication with the first accommodation chamber, and the suction device and the exhaust hole are disposed on the outer housing and communicated with the second accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, a filter screen is provided between the first accommodation chamber and the second accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, a first shutter is provided on the filter screen and configured to switch on or off the communication between the first accommodation chamber and the second accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the sampling probe further comprises a blowing device mounted on the housing and configured to blow air into the first accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the sampling probe further comprises a second shutter mounted on the housing and located at an inside of the blowing device, the second shutter being configured to switch on or off the communication between the blowing device and the first accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the coupling portion comprises a foam material disposed around the outer edge.

According to an embodiment of another aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided an automatic sampling device, comprising: the sampling probe according to any one of the foregoing embodiments; and a robot comprising: a mainbody, and a robot arm mounted on the mainbody, the sampling probe being mounted on the robot arm.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the robot arm and the mounting base of the sampling probe are detachably connected by a flange mechanism.

According to an embodiment of yet another aspect of the present disclosure, there is provided a container detection system, comprising: the sampling probe according to any one of the foregoing embodiments, and a detection device comprising an ion mobility spectrometer that is communicated with the first accommodation chamber through the exhaust hole to receive the gas in the first accommodation chamber.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the container detection system further comprises a robot. The robot comprises: a mainbody; and a robot arm mounted on the mainbody, the sampling probe being mounted on the robot arm.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the detection device further comprises an auxiliary sampling device configured to deliver the gas collected in the first accommodation chamber to the ion mobility spectrometer through the exhaust hole.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the auxiliary sampling device comprises: a first three-way valve having a first end in communication with the exhaust hole; a sampling tube having a first end in communication with a second end of the first three-way valve; a second three-way valve having a first end in communication with a second end of the sampling tube and a second end in communication with an input end of the ion mobility spectrometer; and a sampling pump in communication with a third end of the second three-way valve to suck the gas in the first accommodation chamber into the sampling tube.

According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, the auxiliary sampling device further comprises a feedback pipeline having a first end in communication with an output end of the ion mobility spectrometer and a second end in communication with a third end of the first three-way valve.

