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91��ɫ researcher Grace Grothaus is developing wearable technology and community-driven research tools to help people see the air pollution they encounter every day.

When Grothaus first set out during her PhD studies to make invisible air pollution visible, she envisioned wearable technology that could help people understand the pollutants they encounter while walking, cycling or commuting through their communities.

In 2025, that vision was realized in part through an experimental smart garment featuring illuminated lungs that respond to black carbon pollution, a combustion-related pollutant linked to vehicle traffic, aircraft emissions and wildfires. Using a laboratory-validated black-carbon sensor, the garment was an early proof-of-concept within a broader research project that has now evolved into a fully fledged program.

“The earlier prototype demonstrated that a wearable could sense pollution and translate it into a visual response,” says Grothaus. “But it was an expressive garment rather than something a person would comfortably wear throughout an ordinary day.”

That distinction prompted a significant redesign of the technology and a rethinking of the project as a whole.

As part of a broader initiative called We Are Air Aware, Grothaus set out to create a practical air quality monitor that people could easily wear or carry throughout their daily routines. The result is AirWear, a pocket-sized device that measures particulate pollution and records location-linked environmental data during everyday activities.

The project investigates particulate matter and black carbon, a harmful combustion-related component that is one of the largest contributors to global warming after carbon dioxide. The project, which also considers health risks for black carbon, aims to make pollution exposure and its potential sources perceptible at the scale people encounter them, such as beside traffic, at an intersection or while waiting for transit.

Working with collaborators through 91��ɫ’s Connected Minds program and Professor Shital Desai’s Social and Technological Systems (SaTS) Lab, Grothaus redesigned AirWear for everyday use. Nearly every element was reconsidered, including its electronics, enclosure, attachment system, screen interface, location logging and data storage.

The monitor can be clipped to clothing or a bag, carried as a keyring or worn as a pendant. It displays particulate readings through a simplified interface designed to be understood at a glance.

“We wanted AirWear to be lightweight, discreet, understandable at a glance and adaptable to different bodies and preferences,” says Grothaus. “The aim was not simply to make the electronics as small as possible. It was to create a device that could function as part of everyday life and as part of a participatory research system.”

While AirWear has become the project’s everyday monitoring tool, its artistic roots continue through AtmoSpheres – a series of wearable artworks that raise awareness about air pollution through public performances and exhibitions. We Are Air Aware also includes MyAirWear.ca, where anonymized, location-linked measurements will contribute to community air quality maps.

Together, the three components explore how sensing, visualization, art and community knowledge can make localized particulate air pollution more understandable and ultimately support practical responses.

Perhaps the project’s biggest evolution, however, has been the growing role of community members.

In July 2026, Grothaus and her team held six co-design workshops: three at 91��ɫ through Desai’s SaTS Lab and three with Bathurst Quay residents recruited through the Bathurst Quay Neighbourhood Association. Desai’s expertise helped strengthen the project’s inclusive co-design methods, workshop structure, ethics process and attention to how different participants experience technology.

Rather than asking participants to test and approve a nearly finished device, the team invited them to help shape AirWear before key design decisions had been finalized. Residents invented possible forms, attachment methods and display ideas while reflecting on their experiences with air quality and wearable technology. The team analyzed comments, sketches, clay prototypes, rankings and dot-voting, and is now translating that feedback into the next round of fabrication.

One result was a pale-blue, cloud-shaped enclosure inspired by participants’ preferences for a form that felt approachable, recognizable and positively connected to air. Participants also favoured simple colour-based indicators, flexible carrying options and a design that balanced useful information with comfort and privacy.

“The residents made clear that a technically elegant wearable can still fail if it does not respect how people manage comfort, attention, privacy and social interaction,” says Grothaus.

The workshops also produced a useful surprise. Some participants wanted a visible device that could spark conversations about air pollution; others preferred a small, concealable form that would allow them to decide when to discuss it. The responses challenged an underlying assumption that visibility is not always desirable, even in a project devoted to making pollution visible.

Those insights will shape the project’s next stage, a two-week wear study planned for later this year. Support from Connected Minds, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada's (SSHRC) Explore Grant and a Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research Seed Grant has helped make that phase possible by funding community participation, technical development and preparations for deployment.

Participants will use AirWear during their ordinary routines rather than along prescribed research routes. Grothaus is interested in the pollution people encounter while walking, cycling, commuting, waiting for transit, running errands, exercising outdoors and spending time near places they regularly use.

The devices will record particulate measurements with time and location information, while participants provide feedback about comfort, usability and whether the information affects their awareness or decisions. Public map layers will aggregate measurements and suppress patterns that could identify individuals.

Researchers hope the resulting data will reveal short-lived peaks or recurring exposure hotspots that regional air quality reports or fixed monitors may not capture at the scale of an individual journey. The longer-term goal is to create evidence that communities and decision-makers can use to consider targeted responses involving transit operations, traffic management, idling or street design.

In many ways, those conversations helped shape the project’s current direction.

“Participants did not treat AirWear only as a measuring instrument,” says Grothaus. “They considered what it would feel like to carry, what conversations it might create, what information should come back to them and how individual readings could add up to something useful for the neighbourhood.”

“Making pollution visible remains central to the project, but visibility is not an endpoint,” she adds. “Localized information creates the possibility of connecting a reading to a place, time and activity.”

Through AirWear, MyAirWear.ca and AtmoSpheres, Grothaus hopes to explore how sensing, visualization, art and community knowledge can make localized particulate air pollution more understandable and support practical responses to it.

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