ISO 9001:2015 CertifiedQuality management system · SGS certificate US23/00000276 · valid to June 2029
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Smart Bathroom · a diagnostics concept
Every morning the body leaves its chemistry in the bathroom: breath at the mirror, urine in the toilet, saliva in the rinse, skin on the razor. Our two platforms, mid-infrared spectroscopy for molecules in gas and Intelligent Material crystals for proteins in liquid, could read them quietly every day. A drop of blood only when it's needed.
Concept and research program. Not a medical device, not cleared for diagnosis.
Two platforms, one room
Nothing in the bathroom has to be a laboratory. Gas goes to one sealed analyzer under the counter. Liquid goes into small refillable cartridges. Between them they cover the small molecules you breathe out and the proteins and hormones you can only catch with an antibody.
Quantum and interband cascade lasers tune across the mid-infrared fingerprint region, where each gas absorbs at its own wavelengths. A folded multipass cell gives the beam meters of path in a shoebox, and an infrared detector reads how much light each molecule took.
Each antibody carries its own rare-earth crystal. The reader shines invisible 980 nm light; only the crystals answer, in their own colors. Nothing else in urine, saliva or plastic turns 980 nm light into visible light, so the background stays dark and several targets can be read on one strip.
Six stations
Each station collects what is already there, sends it to the platform that can read it, and adds one point to a personal trend line. Pick a station.
The smart toilet, in depth
Urine and stool are cloudy, colored and full of things that glow by themselves, which is why camera and color-strip toilets miss so much. Infrared in, visible light out: our crystals read straight through the murk. Four automatic steps turn an ordinary flush into a data point.
| Optical | Crystal | |
|---|---|---|
| Chemical specificity | low | ● |
| Cloudy, colored samples | poor | ● |
| No background glow | no | ● |
| Measured amounts | partial | ● |
The analytical razor
A razor touches skin, hair and the air around you almost every day, and its residue builds a daily log of biology and exposure. A small dock cleans and hones the blade, keeps the residue it removes, and reads it two ways: a light-based fingerprint for chemical classes, and crystal immunoassays for specific markers.
Afloat · the smart head
On a warship the bathroom becomes part of force health protection. The heads watch hydration, kidney stress and exposure for every sailor every day; razors in berthing log what the crew breathed and touched on duty. Everything reports to the same crystal reader in sick bay that also tests the water, the galley and the air.
Hydration and heat stress on long watches, kidney strain, and exposure to fuel, solvents and combustion products, sailor by sailor.
The same cartridges triage the crew for chemical, biological and radiation exposure in sick bay, from a finger-prick.
Concept. Trend awareness and exposure screening, not a medical diagnosis; confirmation happens on the reader in sick bay.
The refillable cartridge
A reusable housing holds the microfluidics and the optics window. A small refill pack carries the dried crystal–antibody pairs, the capture lines and a calibrator. Each pack carries an invisible crystal code with its lot calibration, so the reader knows exactly what was loaded and rejects copies.
Example panels. Values on the reader are illustrative, not data.
Molded channels, a metering chamber of fixed volume and a clear optical window. Cleaned in place or replaced only occasionally.
Dried conjugates, capture lines, control and calibrator. One color of crystal for each antibody, so two targets can share a spot.
The same crystal technology that authenticates banknotes marks every pack: lot, expiry and calibration curve, unreadable to the eye.
Calibration microfluidics
Home readings drift: temperature, humidity, an ageing light source, a slightly different drop. So every cartridge runs a calibration lane next to the sample, with a known amount of the same target on the same crystal. The reader reports the sample relative to that known answer. The gas analyzer does the same with room air and a sealed reference cell.
Simple ratio model: the drift scales the sample and the calibrator alike, so the ratio cancels it.
A morning, measured
The point is not one dramatic test. It is many quiet measurements of the same person, so that a change from your own baseline stands out long before it would on a once-a-year visit.
Ten seconds into the port while the lights come on.
The sampler takes a few drops and a little headspace gas.
Fifteen seconds, then spit into the sampler cup.
The sink keeps the first rinse for the cartridge.
Normal days say nothing. A change from your own baseline gets a gentle note, and a suggestion to see a clinician.
A weekly or monthly panel, or when a trend asks for it.
Privacy and honesty
A bathroom is the most private room in the house. The concept is designed around that.
Spectra and line intensities become numbers inside the analyzer. No images, no sound, no raw samples leave the room.
Results are encrypted and shared only with people you choose, such as your clinician.
The system flags changes from your own baseline and points to a clinician. Diagnosis stays with medicine.
Each station has to prove itself in clinical studies before any health claim is made.
IMS mid-infrared gas analyzers with ppb-level sensitivity. Crystal-labelled lateral-flow assays. Clinical breath tests such as exhaled nitric oxide and the urea breath test.
Home breath and toilet sampling, oral-rinse immunoassays, multiplex crystal cartridges with calibration lanes.
Razor-rinse residue: whether it carries useful, repeatable signals is an open research question.
The research behind it
Toilet-mounted sensing, laser breath analysis and upconverting-label immunoassays are each established research fields. The Smart Bathroom puts them in one room around one person.
Smart Bathroom
Fixture makers, diagnostics companies, clinical researchers and insurers: tell us which station matters most to you.
ISO 9001:2015 CertifiedQuality management system · SGS certificate US23/00000276 · valid to June 2029