Sonia Grego

Associate Research Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

I am the founding director of the Duke Smart Toilet Lab, dedicated to the opportunities that data-rich human excreta offer to improve individual and public health. The objective  is to empower individuals and groups in communal living with health information for early warning of disease, health and wellness and management of chronic diseases through wastewater analysis, without any changes of daily habits. I am passionate about the opportunities that advanced sanitation technologies offer to improve global health and to provide a paradigm shift in health screening both for individuals and for communities.

As a major project of my research portfolio over the past 5 years, I have led the field testing of 10+ onsite sanitation technology prototypes from multiple organizations in international settings. I have managed yearlong deployments of sophisticated chemo-mechanical systems with electronic monitoring connected to wastewater pipes of buildings, ensuring no disruption of service to users while evaluating the treatment process performance.

Appointments and Affiliations

• Associate Research Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

Contact Information

• Office Location: 701 W.Main Street, Durham, NC 27708
• Office Phone: (919) 660-5353
• Email Address: sonia.grego@duke.edu
• Websites:
  • Center for Water, Sanitation, Hygiene and Infectious Disease
  • LinkedIn
  • Smart Toilet Lab

Education

• Ph.D. University of Copenhagen (Denmark), 1999
• M.S. Università di Pisa (Italy), 1995

Courses Taught

• ECE 392: Projects in Electrical and Computer Engineering
• EGR 391: Projects in Engineering

In the News

• Making a Cleaner World, One Flush at a Time (Sep 8, 2023 | Duke Magazine)
• ’Smart Toilet’ Uses Artificial Intelligence to Monitor Bowel Health (May 24, 2021)
• Comparing the Swab to the Sewer (Mar 4, 2021 | Pratt School of Engineering)
• Smart Toilet Saves Vital Health Data from Getting Flushed (Feb 3, 2020 | Bass Connections)

Representative Publications

• Zhou, J; McNabb, J; Decapite, N; Ruiz, JR; Fisher, DA; Grego, S; Chakrabarty, K, Stool Image Analysis for Digital Health Monitoring By Smart Toilets, Ieee Internet of Things Journal, vol 10 no. 5 (2023), pp. 3720-3734 [10.1109/JIOT.2022.3158886] [abs].
• Subramani, P; Basil, M; Rosario, P; Jalaja, DR; Choudhary, V; Renganathan, J; Philip, L; Cho, K; Welling, C; Grego, S; Cid, C, Water recycling public toilets based on onsite electrochemical wastewater treatment, Environmental Science: Water Research & Technology (2023) [10.1039/d3ew00454f] [abs].
• Kachoria, P; Sasidaran, S; Welling, CM; Rosario, P; Zhou, J; Chakrabarty, K; Gründl, H; Kristoferitsch, L; Grego, S, Sensor-based evaluation of a Urine Trap toilet in a shared bathroom., The Science of the Total Environment, vol 857 no. Pt 1 (2023) [10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.159178] [abs].
• Welling, CM; Singleton, DR; Haase, SB; Browning, CH; Stoner, BR; Gunsch, CK; Grego, S, Predictive values of time-dense SARS-CoV-2 wastewater analysis in university campus buildings., The Science of the Total Environment, vol 835 (2022) [10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.155401] [abs].
• Grego, S; Welling, CM; Miller, GH; Coggan, PF; Sellgren, KL; Hawkins, BT; Ginsburg, GS; Ruiz, JR; Fisher, DA; Stoner, BR, A hands-free stool sampling system for monitoring intestinal health and disease., Scientific Reports, vol 12 no. 1 (2022) [10.1038/s41598-022-14803-9] [abs].