In August, at least six children in the United States have died of hyperthermia after being shut up in a car on a warm day.

Mark Pelletier, a master electrician and a technician, has invented a car alarm that might save some of the dozens of children who die this way each year.

His programmable circuit board turns on motion-detecting sensors when a car reaches a certain temperature. If motion -even from a sleeping baby- is detected, an alarm goes off. The system is also designed to avert false alarms, it turns on only when the car reaches a certain temperature and if all doors are shut. If the system does not detect any movement within about an hour, it shuts itself off to conserve battery power.

The circuit board is similar to those already present in many cars to monitor engine temperatures or control automatic dome lights, and could be installed fairly cheaply.

Representative Peter T. King last year introduced in Congress a bill that would have required to assess technologies that might reduce the incidence of injury to children left unattended in cars. The bill is still in committee.

Terrill Struttmann, a founder of Kidsincars, an advocacy organization based in Missouri, said that “the technology is there, it’s just that the car companies haven’t adopted it.”

Mr. Pelletier has sent letters to members of Congress, the secretary of transportation and the large automakers, telling them of his invention.

So far, it has been to no avail. “It’s frustrating,” said Mr. Pelletier. “If a piece of industrial equipment were involved in such deaths, he said, “something would be done about it.”

From The New York Times.