DustDuino
dustduino

## What is it? DustDuino can help individuals with limited resources monitor PM10 and PM2.5 concentrations, indoors or outdoors. It uses [Shinyei PPD42NS](http://www.sca-shinyei.com/pdf/PPD42NS.pdf), a $15USD optical sensor that uses an LED and a lens to determine the concentration of dust in a partially closed chamber that draws in air from its surroundings. The sensor data is received by an [Arduino](http://www.arduino.cc/) development board and transmitted to Xively. Prototypes of DustDuino have been successfully built and used in various indoor and outdoor locations. Also see the [Data Logging page](/w/data-logging) for more on setting up and using different dataloggers, and for more tutorials. ### Questions [questions:dustduino] **** ## Why make one? The health effects attributed to outdoor fine particulate matter (PM2.5) rank it among the risk factors with the highest health impacts in the world, [accounting for over 3.2 million premature deaths annually](http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es2025752). In October 2013, the World Health Organization [announced](http://www.iarc.fr/en/media-centre/iarcnews/pdf/pr221_E.pdf) they consider particulate matter, a major component of indoor and outdoor air pollution, as a Group 1 carcinogen along with tobacco smoke and asbestos. ## What can the DustDuino Do? From the [Data Quality Research Note](http://publiclab.org/notes/Willie/03-06-2015/dustduino-data-quality) Test results indicate that DustDuino provides accurate and useful information, albeit of a somewhat limited scope and under certain conditions. An academic [study](http://www.atmos-meas-tech-discuss.net/7/605/2014/amtd-7-605-2014.pdf) which compared the Shenyei particulate matter sensor to costlier models used by governments, researchers, and companies found that this low-cost sensor produced results equivalent to much more expensive ones when analyzing data at hourly intervals. Testing with reference monitors conducted in [Berkeley, California in late 2013](http://www.atmos-meas-tech-discuss.net/7/605/2014/amtd-7-605-2014.pdf) concluded that the results of the low-cost sensor were about equivalent to much more expensive ones when analyzing data at hourly intervals. ”Performance at 1 [hour] integration times was comparable to commercially available optical instruments costing considerably more.” Testing in high PM2.5 environments such as the city of Xi'an, China also has shown [high correlations between the Shenyei and reference monitors](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0269749115000160). By setting up a variety of monitors throughout the city, researchers were able to identify the High-technology Zone site as a potential PM2.5 hotspot with sustained high concentrations compared to the city average throughout the day. There are still some unknowns with regard to the sensor - for example, whether it needs to be co-located with higher-quality instruments for calibration, and whether it could be used in extreme environments. There are also some limitations - the sensor may not produce high-quality information at time intervals shorter than an hour, ## Activities [activities:dustduino] **** ## Photos [![DustDuino.jpg](https://i.publiclab.org/system/images/photos/000/003/998/medium/DustDuino.jpg)](https://i.publiclab.org/system/images/photos/000/003/998/original/DustDuino.jpg) ## Research Notes [notes:dustduino] ## DustDuino Sketches The DustDuino board enables a variety of power, connectivity, and sensor configurations each of which require custom programming to process and send data. As the name would suggest, the DustDuino can be programmed with Arduino libraries and contributors to the project have made a number of Arduino sketches already. A full list of them is available on [DustDuino.org](http://dustduino.org/) ## Scientific Journal Articles | Title | Author(s) | |-------------------------|---------------------| | A [distributed network of low-cost continuous reading sensors](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0269749115000160) to measure spatiotemporal variations of PM2.5 in Xi'an, China; January 13, 2015 [PDF LINK](http://ac.els-cdn.com/S0269749115000160/1-s2.0-S0269749115000160-main.pdf?_tid=9ca954e2-ae5c-11e4-9076-00000aacb35f&acdnat=1423267531_78064379fb071e29e3cf180d34d15365) | Meiling Gao, Junji Cao, Edmund Seto | [Field calibrations of a low-cost aerosol sensor at a regulatory monitoring site in California](http://atmos-meas-tech-discuss.net/7/605/2014/amtd-7-605-2014.pdf); January 27, 2014. | DM Holstius et al ## External Tutorials | Website | Overview | |-------------------------|---------------------| | [Mental Munitions](http://www.mentalmunition.com/2013/10/measure-air-pollution-in-your-home-or.html) | The original documentation blog post | | [Earth Journalism Network- Civic Science & Sensors Program](earthjournalism.net/projects/citizen-science-sensors)| A project page reviewing EJN's sensor journalism pilot project | ## News Articles | Publication | Title | |-------------------------|---------------------| | Nature | [Environmental science: Pollution patrol](http://www.nature.com/news/environmental-science-pollution-patrol-1.16654) | | Scientific American | [Dust in the Wind: How Data Visualization can Help the Environment](http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/dust-in-the-wind-how-data-visualization-can-help-the-environment/) | | Newsweek | [How Civic Science Is Changing Environmentalism](http://www.newsweek.com/2014/11/07/how-civic-science-changing-environmentalism-279777.html) |...


Author Comment Last activity Moderation
warren "Hi, @JuanfraAlvarez - what is the mapping site you're using? Would you be interested in adding a layer to maps across PublicLab.org? We're compilin..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
JamesWarren "Thanks @nanocastro - I would be very happy to see your documentation in Spanish or English, we'd very much like to trial the system where there is ..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
nanocastro "Hi @JamesWarren We have changed the wifi communication for bluetooth and its is possible to save the data into the an SD card. You can find some pi..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
JamesWarren "Hi - would it be possible to adapt your MACA system to work in conditions whereby: there is no WiFi - we'd like to data log the data into a memory ..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
zengirl2 "@cfastie love the MacGyver example--laughed so hard at this. @warren ty for bringing this up during the recent weekly call. I knew this language ra..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Interesting!!! " | Read more » about 6 years ago
xose "Just found this on my sunday net random navigation. Laser PM2.5 Air Quality Sensor For Arduino. £50GBP At the core there's this sensor SKU:SEN0177 " | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "That'd be amazing. Thanks so much! " | Read more » about 6 years ago
nanocastro "HI @warren sure I can post the notes on the #shinyei in a different post, maybe as an answer of your question https://publiclab.org/q/15751... We h..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "There's now a way to collect data from a #dustduino or any #arduino using just an audio cable -- using #webjack ! Take a look at this post: https:..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "This is such a great post about the #shinyei sensor and its limitations and how best to work with it. We'd love to feature your work with the shiny..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Collecting notes on different sensors here! https://publiclab.org/q/15751 " | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Moving some text from the #particle-sensing page by @DavidMack -- thanks, David! Trying to consolidate some scattered info on this across the site ..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Oh, that plotter looks great! Thanks for sharing! So, there are a lot of people out there teaching each other to make great visualizations in the ..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
cfastie "I have not used graphing for live debugging because I didn't know how easy it was to do. I use the live serial monitor in the Arduino IDE all the t..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Hi, @cfastie - do you think this could be adapted pretty easily for live debugging from a #nano-data-logger or #mini-pearl-logger ? " | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "I also proposed this p5js sketch as an example for the p5js web editor: https://github.com/processing/p5.js-web-editor/issues/529 " | Read more » about 6 years ago
aldehyde "Hi. What kind of Framework (for Participatory PM2.5) can use for creating monitoring cities? " | Read more » about 6 years ago
liz "This is so helpful and readable -- a gift! thank you! " | Read more » about 6 years ago
warren "Hi, @nanocastro -- we've been adding a lot of nice features to wiki pages to make them good project landing pages, with a Q&A, activities listi..." | Read more » about 6 years ago
erumenig "Firstly, thanks for elucidate my questions. Let me understand just 1 thing more. After purchase the components and to make "DustDuino" I would hav..." | Read more » over 6 years ago
warren "Thanks all! " | Read more » over 6 years ago
xose "Hi erumenig, find the Shinyei PPD42 sensor, core of the dustduino, here https://www.seeedstudio.com/category/Grove-Dust-Sensor-p-1050.html " | Read more » over 6 years ago
erumenig "Warren and Willie, hello! I would like to thank you for these informations. I heard about them. I'll try to contact the Garoa. Thank you again. " | Read more » over 6 years ago