Siemens is integrating indoor air biosensors into its building automation software that can make automatic changes to ventilation when the sensors detect an indoor air quality risk.
The goal is to reduce the incidence of respiratory disease by 25% over five years, Virginie Maillard, head of global research in simulation and digital twin and head of U.S. research for Siemens Foundational Technologies, said in an email.
“Our approach combines artificial intelligence [and] advanced digital twin modeling with building management systems, ensuring insights can be translated into immediate action,” Maillard said. “These strategies can be tested and optimized virtually before deployment, reducing operational risk while improving effectiveness.”
In workplaces, building operators that provide occupants with a wellness “experience” in the built environment can help attract talent, increase foot traffic, motivate people to spend more and boost employee satisfaction, according to JLL’s 2025 Global Consumer Experience survey.
Siemens’ initiative aims to address one of the biggest challenges that operators face when trying to increase building wellness: IAQ measurement, assessment and response often operate in silos, Maillard said. The lack of integration makes it hard to improve performance in one area without affecting performance in another area.
“Building owners and operators are being asked to deliver healthier indoor environments without compromising [building] performance,” she said.
Without continuous assessment by these biosensors and integrated response, she said, it’s difficult to mitigate airborne health risks effectively.
By combining AI with a digital twin, Siemens can model, predict and optimize building performance and occupant health at the same time, according to Maillard. “The combined intelligence from these two technologies is what will make truly adaptive, healthy buildings possible,” she said.
The system could help building operators build trust with occupants for whom wellness is a priority, Maillard said. “There is … a growing expectation of transparency and trust for occupants, knowing that indoor environments are being actively monitored and optimized to reduce airborne health risks,” she said.
The advancement stems from Siemens’ participation in the Building Resilient Environments for Air and Total Health program, part of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The goal of the ARPA-H BREATHE program is to encourage smart and healthy buildings through the development of integrated systems that will monitor air quality and intervene in real time.
Siemens’ contributions span two BREATHE projects, including a $39 million initiative led by SafeTraces to create a closed loop, array PCR real-time risk assessment and sensor-driven mitigation system for healthy indoor air for the Defense Health Agency hospital system.
“A really important element of being able to understand how to optimize buildings for healthy indoor air is to be able to quantify viruses, bacterias and molds in the built environment,” Jessica Green, program manager, resilient systems, for ARPA-H, said in September, when announcing the research teams that would receive awards from the BREATHE program. “We should be able to sense dozens of different biological targets, and then in real time, we should have software that tells what the risk [is] of being exposed to a certain load of influenza, as an example, or an asthma trigger.”
Maillard said Siemens’ work in the BREATHE program “responds directly to that need by turning novel real‑time air quality insight into automated, actionable building responses.”
Siemens is also working with the Mayo Clinic, Metalmark Innovations and researchers on a five-year, $40 million BREATHE-funded project to implement biosensors and IAQ risk mitigation across Mayo Clinic campuses in Florida, Arizona and Minnesota.
