Project Overview
FoogleTech developed a complete IoT air quality and pollution detection system — from firmware through to a custom-designed PCB — providing real-time monitoring of temperature, humidity, CO2, gas concentrations, and alcohol levels. The system uses Arduino/ESP8266 microcontrollers with DHT11 and MQ135 sensors, a Python backend with MySQL for historical data storage, Gmail API integration for automated threshold alerts, and a custom PCB designed in EasyEDA and manufactured to replace the original breadboard prototype.
The Engineering Challenge
- Integrating DHT11 (temperature/humidity) and MQ135 (gas/CO2/alcohol) sensors on a single microcontroller required careful timing and interrupt management to prevent sensor polling conflicts, while maintaining accurate ppm calibration against established air quality standards.
- Manual monitoring of air quality readings was operationally unsustainable — the system needed to autonomously detect threshold breaches and alert responsible personnel without requiring continuous human oversight of a serial monitor or dashboard.
- The original breadboard prototype was fragile and unsuitable for any real-world deployment environment — a custom PCB needed to be designed and manufactured to make the device robust, compact, and deployable in monitored locations.
- Historical sensor data needed to be captured and stored for compliance and audit purposes — with a database backend capable of supporting multi-day trend analysis and reporting.
Our Solution
- FoogleTech developed the firmware in Arduino (C/C++) running on an ESP8266, implementing a sensor fusion loop that reads DHT11 temperature/humidity and MQ135 gas concentration data in non-blocking alternating cycles — with calibration constants applied in firmware to convert raw ADC values to calibrated ppm readings aligned to air quality standards.
- An automated alert pipeline was built using Python and the Gmail API: sensor readings are streamed from the ESP8266 to a Python backend over serial, evaluated against configurable threshold values, and trigger automated email notifications to designated recipients when CO2, gas concentration, temperature, or humidity exceeds safe operating limits.
- All sensor readings are timestamped and stored in a MySQL database by the Python backend, building a continuous historical record queryable for trend analysis, peak detection, and compliance reporting — with a serial port display interface for local real-time monitoring.
- FoogleTech designed a custom PCB in EasyEDA, integrating the ESP8266, sensor headers, power regulation, and signal conditioning into a compact single-board form factor — fabricated using Copperplate PCB manufacturing and assembled with a 5V power supply input, replacing the breadboard prototype with a deployable hardware product.
Results & Outcomes
- Real-time monitoring of temperature, humidity, CO2, gas concentration, and alcohol levels operational on custom production PCB — replacing the fragile breadboard prototype with a deployable, robust hardware unit.
- Automated Gmail alert system operational with zero manual monitoring required — threshold breach events trigger instant email notifications to responsible personnel.
- MySQL database capturing continuous historical sensor data for multi-day trend analysis, peak detection, and compliance audit documentation.
- Custom PCB design completed in EasyEDA and successfully manufactured — all sensors, power supply, and communication interfaces operating correctly on the production board.
Why IoT Air Quality & Pollution Detector Chose FoogleTech Software
FoogleTech Software is a specialist engineering company with over a decade of expertise in AI, embedded systems, IoT, and full-stack software development — serving product teams and enterprises across Agriculture & IoT and beyond. Our engineers don't just write code — they understand the domain, the constraints, and the real-world pressures that ship deadlines create. For IoT Air Quality & Pollution Detector, that meant deploying a pre-vetted team with direct experience in Arduino, ESP8266, DHT11, reducing ramp-up time from months to days and delivering production-quality work from the first sprint.
Every FoogleTech engagement starts with a structured discovery phase, follows a disciplined agile delivery model with daily engineering syncs, and ends with complete documentation handover — so your in-house team owns the outcome. No black boxes, no lock-in.