AquapHOx · The first high-performance, all-in-one optical sensor technology to monitor the health of our oceans

AquapHOx is a new optical sensor technology for aqueous environments that measures critical parameters essential to monitor the health of our oceans. Oceans cover more than 70% of the earth surface and are responsible for the basic biogeochemical cycles. Today, CO2 emissions have already led to a dramatic acidification of the oceans. A slight change of the pH value in water has a serious effect on the complete ecosystem and thereby our climate. To get a comprehensive overview of the oceans’ status, marine R&D companies and organisations are urgently looking for technologies to measure under deep-sea conditions i.a. pH values, O2, O2 traces, CO2. In addition, aquaculture is a booming market requiring highly precise measurement of such parameters to monitor water quality and guarantee healthy and environmentally-sustainable farming conditions. Yet, current systems are either non-existent or have very low performance. AquapHOx enables, for the first time, pH measurement under deep-sea conditions, exceeds the state-of-the-art for O2 measurement and allows for the first time to measure several parameters with a single instrument, enabling large-scale, stable, accurate measurements and a reduction of up to 80% of purchasing, maintenance, transport and renting costs. In addition, it is extendable to the measurement of further parameters (CO2, ammonium). By the end of the project, PyroScience will introduce 2 product versions of AquapHOx to the market: one for OEMs and one for end users. The AquapHOx series will be first offered to the marine R&D (especially oceanography) and the aquaculture markets. In a second step, PyroScience will address growth markets of bioprocessing and of water quality control, where further strong market potential has been assessed. Further promising application is expected in medical applications, i.e. blood gas and breath gas analyses. AquapHOx will largely contribute to the PyroScience group’s growth: €28.61M turnover and +52 employees by 2024.