FALSELY triggered fire alarms kill, since they can divert firefighters away from blazes elsewhere. Now one major source of false alarms – cigarette smoke – is to be extinguished, thanks to a smoke detector with an electronic nose.
Developed under the European Information Society Technologies programme, in work led by Wagner Alarm of Langenhagen, Germany, the detector distinguishes between the gases in cigarette smoke and those from burning wood, cotton, paper or polyurethane foam.
It uses an array of conducting polymers whose resistance changes depending on which volatile gases are present. It contains a neural network that can recognise which patterns of resistance correspond to fire, and which to cigarette smoke.
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A commercial product should be ready by October 2006.
