Adafruit contact less infrared thermopile sensor breakout adafruit 1296 p the adafruit contactless infrared thermopile sensor breakout is unusual in that it uses a thermopile which senses infra red radiation at a distance in order to measure temperature it has an almost 180 deg field of view and measures the average temperature across that view in order to focus in on a specific target the sensor has to be close enough that the object occupies a significant portion of its field of view p