A report of the Scientific Committee on Occupational Exposure Limits  (SCOEL) highlights that work-related exposures are estimated to account  for about 15% of all adult respiratory diseases. Volatile organic  compounds (VOC) are within working environment one of the highest cause  of asthma, lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD),  cystic fibrosis (CF), and respiratory tract infections. In 2011 INAIL  drew a report on occupational diseases showing that the working places  with the highest percentage of respiratory diseases are agriculture,  manufacturing and transportation sectors. Among those, the manufacturing  sector with 5172 cases of respiratory diseases in 2010 is the most  dangerous one. According to the International Labour office the best way  to reduce the number of risks and of disease is, besides information,  the prevention both for the workers and for the employer.

There  are two levels of prevention: (i) environmental monitoring and (ii) the  use of personal protective equipment. The present research proposal  aims at developing a novel concept to prevent respiratory diseases  inside the specific working environment of a coating plant. The choice  of a coating plant is considered strategic for the project execution for  two main reasons. Workers of this environment are highly exposed to the  inhalation of several damaging agents (voc, organic dust, chemical  contaminants, paints, varnishes) that cause respiratory disease. The  high level of ratio between number of operators and sales volumes all  over Europe.

The objective of the project will be to design  and prototype a plurisensorial wearable device with protective purpose,  able to detect the air quality and the health conditions of the workers.  The product will be also equipped with a device able to alert the user  of hazardous conditions (voc evaporation or breathing problems) and to  transmit the monitored data to the control room. The project will be  developed exploiting technological solutions already/today adopted in  medical field (i.e wearable monitoring systems for physiological  parameters) and military ones (i.e the electronic nose developed by  Nasa).