Although IEEE Spectrum’s offices reopened several weeks ago, I have not been back and continue to work remotely—as I suspect many, many other people are still doing. Reopening offices, schools, gyms, restaurants, or really any indoor space seems like a dicey proposition at the moment.

Generally speaking, masks are better than no masks, and outdoors is better than indoors, but short of remaining holed up somewhere with absolutely no contact with other humans, there’s always that chance of contracting COVID-19. One of the reasons I personally haven’t gone back to the office is because the uncertainty over whether the virus, exhaled by a coworker, is present in the air, doesn’t seem worth the novelty of actually being able to work at my desk again for the first time in months.

Unfortunately, we can’t detect the virus directly, short of administering tests to people. There’s no sensor you can plug in and place on your desk that will detect virus nuclei hanging out in the air around you. What is possible, and might bring people some peace of mind, is installing IoT sensors in office buildings and schools to monitor air quality and ascertain how favorable the indoor environment is to COVID-19 transmission.

Read more: Indoor Air-Quality Monitoring Can Allow Anxious Office Workers to Breathe Easier