CES 2015: The Mint breathalyser detects dehydration and bad breath

Being dehydrated is no good thing, and having bad breath certainly isn’t. There are a lot of different tricks you can use to detect and combat them both, but wouldn’t it be easier just to have a mini breathalyser that does it for you?

That’s what the Mint is for. Designed by the folks at Breathometer, Mint is a standard alcohol breathalyser that’s been tweaked to detect different chemicals in your mouth. The best part is that unlike standard breathalysers, you don’t actually have to blow into it because it uses a mini fan to draw in the air from your mouth.

For bad breath Mint will analyse the levels of Hydrogen Sulphide, Methyl Mercaptan, and Hydrogen Disulphide in the users’ mouth and relay that information to an accompanying smartphone app via Bluetooth. On the off-chance that someone doesn’t understand what the levels mean, the app has a scale of breath freshness that’s visualised using mint leaves.

Dehydration detection works in a similar way, but rather than checking for the presence of chemicals Mint will detect the levels of moisture in your mucus membrane. Because this is the first place dehydration takes place, it means you might be able to catch it early and act accordingly.

Similar meters are available for detecting bad breath, but they’re often cheap which can mean they’re inaccurate. Breathometer already has an accurate standard breathalyser on the market called Breeze, so you can be sure that Mint will be good at what it does.

You’ll have to wait until August to get your hands on one, but you can pre-order one for $149 (£98) on Indiegogo right now.

This week we’re bringing you all the latest news, videos and gossip from CES 2015 in Las Vegas. Check out the CES 2015 page to keep up to date and subscribe to our YouTube channel to see hands-on news with our editor Holly Brockwell from the show floor.