These Toilets Will Know Everything About You
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Smart toilets on the market today primarily boast energy savings with more accurate flushes or simple luxuries like a seat warmer or massaging bidet.\\xa0
Researchers from the University of Wisconsin and Morgridge Institute for Research are working on a smart toilet with knowledge that extends beyond the basin.\\xa0
The team is working on a proof of concept smart toilet that would analyze your urine to keep tabs on your health.\\xa0
Metabolites in the urine have known associations with 600 human conditions, everything from diabetes to cancer. Your pee knows everything about your eating habits to exercise as well as the medication you use and even sleep quality.\\xa0
The team conducted a pilot study on themselves. Professor Joshua Coon and Data Scientist Ian Miller analyzed 110 samples collected over ten days and found that it tracked everything from coffee and alcohol consumption to when they took Tylenol.\\xa0
The Coon Research Group is now designing a toilet that will incorporate a portable mass spectrometer that can recognize the user and process samples. They say it's "a bit Rube Goldberg-like" but functional, and they plan to install the toilet in their research facility.
Coon believes the "smart toilet" concept could have significant health implications for the global population. If you pair it with efforts from the Gates Foundation to reinvent the toilet, we just might save the world one toilet at the time.\\xa0
While the proof of concept will likely cost tens of thousands of dollars, the price would probably come down with mass-market adoption. How many people are in the world now? 7.7 billion.
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