This project is an IoT-based environmental monitoring system designed to ensure the correct preservation of vaccines by continuously measuring temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, air quality (PM), TVOC, and CO₂ levels in real time.
The system was developed as a functional prototype focused on vaccine cold-chain monitoring, addressing one of the most critical challenges in the pharmaceutical logistics industry: preventing losses caused by failures in environmental control during storage and transportation.
Failures in cold-chain logistics are a major cause of vaccine waste worldwide. Studies estimate that up to 30% of vaccines are lost due to improper temperature control, directly impacting public health and increasing operational costs.
This project aims to provide a cost-effective, scalable, and easy-to-use monitoring solution for small and medium-sized pharmaceutical companies, enabling real-time supervision, historical tracking, and alerting when environmental conditions exceed safe thresholds.
- Develop an IoT prototype capable of measuring:
- Temperature
- Humidity
- Atmospheric pressure
- Air quality (PM)
- TVOC and CO₂
- Transmit sensor data in real time using MQTT
- Store and process data in a centralized backend
- Visualize data through a secure web platform
- Trigger visual and audible alerts when critical thresholds are exceeded
- Maintain a measurement error margin below 5%
- Document system performance through controlled testing
- ESP8266 microcontroller
- Sensors:
- BME280 – Temperature, Humidity, Pressure
- PMS5003 – Particulate Matter (Air Quality)
- CCS811 – TVOC and CO₂
- Buzzer for local audible alerts
- Prototype mounted inside a thermal cooler to simulate real cold-chain conditions
- Wi-Fi connectivity
- MQTT protocol (Mosquitto broker)
- UART communication for sensor data acquisition
- Node-RED for:
- MQTT topic subscription
- Data processing and routing
- Integration with the database and web platform
- MySQL database
- Stores:
- Sensor measurements (timestamped)
- User credentials
- Historical records
- Secure authentication system
- Real-time dashboard
- Historical data visualization and filtering
- Responsive design for desktop, tablet, and mobile devices
- User authentication and access control
- Real-time sensor data visualization (≤ 3s delay)
- Visual alerts when conditions exceed setpoints
- Historical data records with date-based filtering
- Responsive UI for multiple devices
- Intuitive interface designed for non-technical medical staff
- Local alerts via buzzer when critical conditions are detected
- Remote alerts sent to mobile devices using N8N
- Clearly distinguishable visual alert indicators on the dashboard
- C++
- Arduino IDE
- ESP8266
- MQTT (Mosquitto)
- Node-RED
- N8N
- UART
- WebSockets
- PHP
- MySQL
- HTML
- CSS
- JavaScript
- Vaccine cold-chain monitoring
- Pharmaceutical storage supervision
- Environmental condition tracking
- IoT data visualization and alerting
- Remote monitoring systems
🥉 Third Place Winner — ExpoIngenierías 2025
Tecnológico de Monterrey, Campus Sonora Norte
This project was awarded third place for its innovation, real-world applicability, and successful integration of IoT hardware, backend services, and web technologies.
✅ Fully functional end-to-end prototype
✅ Real-time data acquisition and visualization
✅ Stable MQTT communication and backend processing
✅ Local and remote alerting mechanisms operational
✅ Historical data storage and retrieval implemented
This project was developed for academic and prototype purposes. It is not certified for medical or commercial deployment without further validation and regulatory approval.
Feel free to explore the repository to review the firmware, backend workflows, database schema, and web platform implementation.