I know there is some kind of gadget in the world that can read the number of particles in the air. What is it?

Question

I know they are available in black and are about the size of half a shoe box. They can read the number of some kind of particles. They used one in some kind of documentary once where they read the number of ink particles that printers release. Please help! :-)

Answer 1

Well it's not imaginative but I think it's called "Particle Counter" - you may want to check out this particular website on them (they do have a section focussing on air particle counters:

http://www.particlecounters.org/

Answer 2

They are called particle counters or sniffers.

Heres one:

http://www.purifierpro.com/product/201-1...