Stanford University researchers have created a smart toilet that can analyze stool and urine to detect potential diseases, including some forms of cancer. The smart toilet (which is still in the experimental stage) can also identify users by both their fingerprints and “anal prints.” Yes, there are those too.
The researchers published their findings in a new study in the journal Nature Biomedical Engineering. The study involved 21 people who tested the smart toilet over several months.
“The smart toilet is the ideal way to tap into a data that is often overlooked. And the user doesn’t have to do anything different,” researcher Sanjiv Gambhir said in a statement.
The toilet used for the study was actually a basic toilet, with tools high -tech motion-sensing built into it. The smart toilet records (videos) the user 's urine and feces , which are analyzed by algorithms.
The smart toilet also uses some urine analysis strips to measure the urine's white blood cell count and detect protein levels that determine whether the user is healthy or suffering from diseases, such as bladder infections, cancer, diabetes or possible kidney failure.
The datacollected is stored in a cloud-based system, which access doctors
One of the most unusual features of this smart toilet is a built-in identification systemthat reads both fingerprints and their "anal prints." This is very important because:
“The whole point is to provide accurate, personalized health feedback, so we had to make sure the smart toilet could distinguish between different users,” Gambhir said. “We know it sounds weird, but as it turns out, your anal fingerprint is unique.”.
Fingerprints and anal prints allow specific data to be linked to specific users, which is necessary if multiple people use the smart toilet. However, the anal print is not sent to doctors and the cloud system (it is only used to identify users).
Soon, other people will participate in the research and an attempt will be made to incorporate molecular characteristics into stool analysis.
“This is a little more difficult,” Gambhir said, “but we are working on it.”.
