Solar food dryer Appalachian state university

I think this might be the one I make since they have worked out all the ins and outs of it.

http://appropriatetec.appstate.edu/sites/appropriatetec.appstate.edu/files/HP_Solar_Food_Dryer_Article.pdf

But I wonder if anyone here is knowledgeable about arduinos and could one be coupled with a solar panel taken from a garden light and a thermometer so that the vents on this thing could be monitored mechanically and I could be about my own business!
I have emailed Dennis Scanlin (the smart fella who wrote the article) and he says "Sounds cool. I think the best way would be to control the vent opener with an adjustable temperature sensor. So you could set the max temperature you wanted to expose the drying food or herbs to and then the vents would start opening when the temperature was reached and closed when the temp dropped too much below this temperature. The devil is in the details, but sounds like a good idea to me."
So is there anyone out there that might want to take this on?

Thanky in advance!!
Rose

I'm sure it could be done with an arduino, but I think I would skip the electronics and go for one of those automatic greenhouse vent openers. that option would probably not have near the temperature resolution that an electronic temp probe would have, so if you really want fine tuning, go for the arduino or raspberry pi.

Thanks for the info Tel, the food dryer instructions say that 180 degrees (if I'm not mistaken) is when the food will start to cook so they offer a loose range of temperature but to be optimum, going "close" to 180 would be the ticket. That greenhouse vent opener would definatly be what I want if it could detect temperatures fairly colse to that, but its not affordable to me. I find myself wondering if there is a way to make one of those rather than the electronic one I was thinking about. Other than that, I will just be training myself to go check the contraption manually