In the race to make everything in the house smart, internet connected fridges are often held up as an example of what an underwhelming endeavour the Internet of Things can be. It can tell you when you're running low on milk? Great - so can my eyes, and as an emergency backup, so can my tastebuds and stomach in a pinch.
But a fridge that can tell you that the food you're about to cook up will have you throwing your guts up within hours… well, yes, that would be extremely helpful. Thanks, fridge! Good boy!
While this technology is currently limited to the lab in South Korea, making it somewhat prohibitive for you or me to scan our lunches, the researchers suggest that the technology could eventually be packaged into an affordable scanner that detects microorganisms within seconds - even if meat is packaged in plastic.
“The present method can also be implemented in an existing refrigerator with a laser diode and a simple photodetector,” the researchers write.
One drawback is that the scanner can't tell you what kind of microorganism your meat has… just that there's something wrigglingon it, but to be honest, that's around the level of detail I need to make an informed choice and pass on dinner.
The flip side is that it could also cut down on food waste from people not wanting to take a chance on meat that they're concerned could be dicey, but is actually still perfectly good.
In other words, smart fridges of the future might be good for more than just counting milk cartons - they could make you dodge a food poisoning bullet. That's the kind of feature I can really get behind.
Images: Ant Jackson and Veronique used under Creative Commons
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