Wasabi fire alarm a lifesaver for the deaf (2008) | Hacker News Reader

Wasabi fire alarm a lifesaver for the deaf (2008)

reuters.com

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It looks like they won a IG Nobel in 2011: https://www.improbable.com/ig-about/winners/#ig2011

And it's in the National Museum of Scotland: https://www.nms.ac.uk/explore-our-collections/stories/scienc...

Unfortunately I can't seem to find any evidence that they turned it into a real product.

This old page makes it look like it was a real product, unclear how it was sold though. Also no product name, oddly...

https://web.archive.org/web/20160304171428/http://www.pixen-...

“臭気発生装置 WA-1型(Odor generation device Type WA-1)” seems to be the name. Listed on Rakuten for about $516 but not sure if it’s in stock or merely listed there.

Looks like it works as a wireless slave device for compatible smoke detectors, with one included in the kit.

I dated a girl once with a hearing impairment -- she was deaf in one ear, impaired (mostly high frequency) in the other. She had a strobe light smoke detector in her room.

One night I stayed over and woke up to the fire alarm (roommate had burnt some popcorn). She slept right through the alarm and I had to wake her.

She said she'd upgrade to a "bed shaker" alarm. Not sure how well that worked out, we stopped dating shortly after (end of semester).

The Wasabi alarm sounds interesting, but if it's defeated by a blocked nose, maybe the bed shaker type is better.

Wasabi is also a great way to relieve congestion.

Is it like the nasal sprays where it gets less and less effective? If not, I might buy a jar :D

Beware with the elderly, as smell can also be a sense which diminishes with age, or as a comorbidity of conditions such as Parkinson's disease.

The power of wasabi isn't really the smell so much as it is a chemical interaction between allyl isothiocyanate and TRPA1. So in that sense it is more similar to the heat from a chili pepper than it is the aroma of something. I'm not positive, but I don't believe there is age related reduction in feelings of heat from capsaicin.

Long shot, but maybe you know the answer.

There is some chemical in certain shampoos that affects me more than most. The sensation is less like smelling and more like something is penetrating into my nose. It doesn't feel quite like burning or heat, but it's intense in a sort of similar way.

Sorry that's vague, but maybe this is a well-known thing.

Perhaps it's Tea Tree Oil:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_tree_oil

Trader Joe's in the U.S. sells a line of shampoo/conditioner that has that extract in it, and if it gets into my eyes it's game over.

https://www.traderjoes.com/digin/post/tea-tree-tingle-bath-p...

Others mentioned possible candidates, add eucalyptus to the list. Lots of people react to it that way.

My guess would be the menthol in peppermint.

Could it be peppermint?

> Except for one person with a blocked nose, all woke up within two minutes of the smell reaching them.

Seems like a pretty bad failure mode, if it doesn’t work when people have a bad cold.

Also, the time delay is an issue. An audible alarm can wake people up much faster.

One thing they might be to use an sound based alarm, but that has enough low frequencies that it makes your skull resonate. A lot of dead people, may have conduction issues, and the sound can be transmitted through bone. For the people that have a neurological basis for deafness, even sounds that you cannot perceive if they resonate the right structures can make you feel uncomfortable.

I've seen fire alarms that use very bright, flashing lights. Those might very well wake someone up from a dead sleep, but I'm not sure what the research says on them.

As someone who slept under one that would start flashing just before the sound started, oh yes, the light alone can wake you up. It's like a flash of lightning, or at least a really bright camera flash.

Seems like a bed/pillow rumble pak is what you'd want for being asleep, and the common strobe light should suffice while awake.

Actually, smart watches could be very helpful in that case: If an alarm happens, the watch can vibrate very intensely to wake the user up.

If you want your own wasabi spray, maybe for a weekend iot doorbell project.. here you are. https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B003XPHDXG/

This is the most clever thing I've seen posted on this site in a while. This was in 2008 and they said it would be sold within two years, so I assume that it wasn't a successful product? Or at least never made it to the West?

One problem I don’t know how to solve for this, is that wasabia japonica is fairly expensive, hard to grow or find, and not shelf stable.

The vast majority of “wasabi” is horseradish and food coloring.

They mention in the article that the smell is produced synthetically (presumably for this exact reason).

If the natural compound is not shelf stable I wonder what the difference with the synthetic is.

The synthetic could be more powerful, something like the difference between THC and synthetic THC.

Perhaps you're confusing THC with synthetic cannabinoids. The molecule doesn't care whether it's made by plants or at a lab.

Plants yield a mixture of cannabinoids at some concentration, which constitute ~10% of the dried plant matter. These can be extracted and separated with various techniques. The effects of pure THC are different than that of the mixture.

Upcoming schemes use engineered micro-organisms to produce specific cannabinoids, efficiency of the systems is ramping up. My understanding is that the synthesis of cannabinoids is is quite an inefficient way of manufacture.

None the less, it's all the same - covalently bound atoms :)

A few months ago I took a safety training course. In the course the instructor showed us a video of a voice fire alarm, which talked along with emitting a shrill sound. The reason was that some people, especially children, could not be awakened by the alarm sound, but will wake upon hearing a human voice. I have a mix of old and new fire alarms, and my new fire alarm does indeed talk in addition to emitting the alarm sound.

Information seems to be scant about how this has fared since the article was written. But it looks like it launched in 2009 and also won an Ig Nobel prize: https://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/a7253/our-favori...

Reminds me of a story someone told me, about her grandparents who were both deaf. They had an alarm clock that had a string attached to their wrist, and would tug when they needed to wake up.

I think I have seen alarm clock systems marketed for the fully deaf which are a vibrating thing you ziptie underneath your mattress/box spring.

It's well known you can't smell while you sleep so why is this a good idea?

(Other than the many many other reasons it's a bad idea)

Given how ammonia smelling salts can be used to revive people that are unconscious, I can see how wasabi vapor could have the same effect

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smelling_salts#Usage

"Smelling salts are used to arouse consciousness because the release of ammonia (NH3) gas that accompanies their use irritates the membranes of the nose and lungs, and thereby triggers an inhalation reflex. This reflex alters the pattern of breathing, resulting in improved respiratory flow rates and possibly alertness."

The article on Wasabi says smell, smelling salts are not actually olfactory.

So like what happens if you inhale wasabi?

The article on Wasabi says smell, smelling salts are not actually olfactory.

The article was a few paragraph press release meant for mainstream news, not a technical description.

Elsewhere you can find more details:

Wasabi has a pungent odor that irritates the nose, and it was this property of the plant that was used for the fire alarm

...

When wasabi has been grated, the allyl isothiocyanate contained in it is broken down by an enzyme and becomes a bitter gas that stimulates the nervous system. Surprisingly, it can wake people up, both hearing-impaired and non-hearing-impaired alike, within a period of 10 seconds to two minutes, according to the experiments

https://web-japan.org/trends/11_sci-tech/sci120315.html

So you'd be lightly macing them.

I think it would be hard to get the dosage correct in a room with fans and airconditioning and windows that may or may not be on.

And fun to test every 6 months.

But it is interesting.

Not (always) beeing able to smell during sleep is precisely why we have smoke detectors.

[citation needed]

And, from the article:

He said the Wasabi smoke detector was tested on 14 people, including four deaf people. Except for one person with a blocked nose, all woke up within two minutes of the smell reaching them.

You can look for the wives tale online, but it is a wives tale based on truth

"Minimal Olfactory Perception During Sleep: Why Odor Alarms Will Not Work for Humans"

https://www.vinparleur.net/IMG/pdf/Why_odor_alarms_will_not_...

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