Online Quantitative Monitoring of Microalgae Concentration Using a Coupled Neural Network with Self-Search and Group Convolution

Effective monitoring of microalgae cultivation is essential for optimizing energy utilization efficiency. This paper presents a deep neural network algorithm that combines a self-search mechanism with a group convolution strategy for predicting the concentration of microalgae (Chlorella) in real-time. The research shows that the proposed algorithm achieves a prediction accuracy of 0.93 on sparse datasets, significantly outperforming traditional residual networks (0.72). The group convolution module demonstrates strong feature extraction capabilities in the datasets with uniform color characteristics, while the self-search architecture reduces the risk of underfitting in sparse datasets and thus lowers model training costs. The experimental prototype developed using this method showed excellent performance in field tests for online quantitative analysis. This study provides a cost-effective and feasible machine learning solution for online monitoring of energy microalgae cultivation in small dataset scenarios. These findings demonstrate the potential of the proposed approach for scalable, real-time monitoring in microalgae cultivation.