The new Dyson backpack will measure the air quality in London

Dyson is essentially an air company, which manufactures vacuums, hand dryers and expensive hairdryers. The company also plans to get into portable devices with a pair of headphones that also serves as an air purifier.

For now, Dyson is going in a different clothing direction. The company announced that it was building a backpack that will monitor the air that children breathe when they go to school and go away. This device is part of a study of King & s College London, the Greater London Authority and the C40 Breathe London initiative, which will measure the air quality in London, especially for children from disadvantaged neighborhoods.

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The Dyson purification fans and heaters already have a monitoring technology capable of detecting particulates, nitrogen dioxide and VOCs in order to continuously monitor the quality of the air. The company has now redesigned these sensors to fit into a sensor housing placed in a special backpack. It also contains a rechargeable battery pack that can help capture data for a week.

As for the look, it looks like a clbadic school backpack – but with a vent in the back that will suck in the air that the sensors will badyze. There is also room for a bottle of water and a nice patch saying "I am an air quality scientist".

Sensors can detect ultrafine particles of PM2.5 that can penetrate deeply into your respiratory system and blood, PM10 particles (such as pollen, dust and allergens), nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide .

Five London schools will participate in the study, including Marner Elementary School, Charlotte Sharman Elementary School, East Sheen Elementary School, Haimo Elementary School and the University of New York. Lordship Lane Primary School. More than 250 children aged 8 to 11 will participate in the study.

Improving air quality has been one of the priorities of London Mayor, Sadiq Khan, in 2019, and Paul Dawson, Vice President of Health and Beauty at Dyson. , pointed out that children can breathe up to 30,000 breaths a day. Thus, there is no better place to start than the kids who might be the most vulnerable to the poor quality of the air.

On a larger scale, it is one of the largest companies in the sector that is embarking on the wearable. And thanks to the rumors of a facial mask, it is not difficult to see that the company could develop in the future. We could consider a future in which it will become easy for Dyson to design sensors small enough to fit into a face mask, for example.