SpaceKidz-Young Scientist India 2015 Finalist

The Electronic Nose, for an Internet of Toilets.

The biggest challenge in keeping toilets clean and usable all the time is to ensure that it is cleaned whenever necessary. Normally public toilets are cleaned at regular intervals. This may vary from 3-4 times a day to just once a day in some places. Sometimes due to scarcity of water the number of times it is cleaned may have to be minimised. On the other hand sometimes the usages may have been less and hence a cleaning process done just because it is scheduled may lead to wastage of water. Hence in order to optimise the usage of water and to ensure that the toilets are always kept clean we have proposed here an idea to install ‘Electronic Noses’ that will trigger off an alarm indicating the need to clean the toilet. Hence the toilets besides being cleaned at regular intervals could be cleaned on demand as well. On the other hand the toilets could also only be cleaned on demand and hence the regular schedules for cleaning could be avoided to save water.

Our Prime Minster Narendra Modi had mentioned in his 2014 Independence day message, that he is going to ensure that toilets are built in all schools across India before the next Independence Day. We would be happy if this proposed ‘Electronic Nose’ is made mandatory in each toilet so that the toilets will be kept clean and usable all the time especially in the schools.

The Electronic Nose (E-Nose): The concept of the ‘electronic nose’ has been used successfully for several other purposes. We found innovative and interesting applications of the ‘E-Nose’ while browsing the Internet, and we realised that it has not yet been used for the purpose proposed by us. ‘E-Nose’ in toilets is indeed an innovative idea. It can be introduced in the new toilets that are coming up in all schools across India.

We understand from the various information that we read on the internet that in order to design an ‘electronic nose’ you require sensors that can detect odour and a circuit that can make sense out of the signals and trigger an alarm indicating the need to clean the toilet.

It also occurred to us that there are certain practical problems in using these sensors. Take for instance, the sensor could trigger a false alarm when it has an occupant but this could be solved, by placing another sensor to detect the presence of an occupant. The alarm should take into consideration the signals from both these sensors. The time interval before an alarm gets triggered could also be extended to ensure that it was not a false alarm. These are easy reasoning strategies that could be brought into the design while installing it.