Samsung and Google Inc. announced today the beta release of something that’s being described as the “New Scent-sation in Search”: the Google Sensor.
According to the joint news release, the Google Sensor would attach via mini-USB to the upcoming 5G release of the new Samsung Galaxy S5 Round. Through the much anticipated curved-LED porous screen sensor, with a corresponding hand-held porous sensor, the Google Sensor is able to analyze the air to determine smell and taste, and identify and analyze molecular data of various surfaces.
The Google Sensor has broad applications in science and molecular research, but may also have household applications including personal entertainment and curiosity.
Samsung and Android users will not be able to upgrade through their existing products. They will have to wait for the release of the Samsung Galaxy Round SG running Android 4.4 (Kitkat) API 19 but requires the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) that supports OpenGL ES 2.0 hardware acceleration. Samsung will release the 3-sided, 5.7″ LED porous screen with the Samsung Galaxy 5G.
According to technical specifications, it is the 770 porous, “Ultra-touch” sensors on the Galaxy Round 5G that allow molecules to be analyzed. In addition, the Google Sensor device has an additional 490 porous “ultra-touch” sensors. Ultra-touch has been patented by Samsung. The data is gathered by the smartphone screen sensor is compared to the data gathered by the device sensor and compared to algorithms continued in the Google Sensor software database, which is proprietary to Google Inc. During initial testing, results indicate a 98 percent accuracy rate in identifying smells, tastes and touch sensors. If you were to hold the Google Sensor in the air, or rub the Google Sensor into an unidentified surface it would provide both a molecular composition and a common-name description of the given sample.
Beta testing of the Google Sensor is continuing into the new year. Unfortunately, this has been closed to current beta-clients testing the Samsung Galaxy Round S5. No release date has been announced for either the Samsung Galaxy Round or the Google Sensor.
