electronic nose tagged posts

Odor test spotted cancer with up to 95 percent accuracy. An odor-based test that sniffs out vapors emanating from blood samples was able to distinguish between benign and pancreatic and ovarian cancer cells with up to 95 percent accuracy, according to a new study from researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine.

The findings suggest that the Penn-developed tool — which uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to decipher the mixture of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitting off cells in blood plasma samples — could serve as a non-invasive approach to screen for harder-to-detect cancers, such as pancreatic and ovarian.

The results ...

The MOF used in this study consists of organic molecules (in grey and black) and metal ions (zirconium, in purple). Between these molecules are little holes that can absorb the phosphanates (in yellow). © KU Leuven – Centre for Surface Chemistry & Catalysis

The best-known electronic nose is the breathalyser. As drivers breathe into the device, a chemical sensor measures the amount of alcohol in their breath. This chemical reaction is then converted into an electronic signal, allowing the police officer to read off the result. Alcohol is easy to detect, because the chemical reaction is specific and the concentration of the measured gas is fairly high. But many other gases are complex mixtures of molecules in very low concentrations.

Researchers from KU Leuven have now built a very sensitiv...

Researchers determined that using integrated circuits, including one shown right of the US quarter and below the label ‘CHIP1’ in an electronic nose will make the device more affordable. Credit: UT Dallas

Researchers at Texas Analog Center of Excellence (TxACE) at UT Dallas are working to develop an affordable electronic nose that can be used in breath analysis for a wide range of health diagnosis. While devices that can conduct breath analysis using compound semiconductors exist, they are bulky and too costly for commercial use. The researchers determined that using CMOS integrated circuits technology will make the electronic nose more affordable.

CMOS is the integrated circuits technology used to manufacture the bulk of electronics that have made smartphones, tablets and other devices po...

Timur Muksunov is a research engineer at Tomsk State University (Russia). Credit: Copyright Tomsk State University

Scientists have created a gas analyzer – ‘electronic nose’ that is able to assess the quality of the food, cosmetic, and medical products, to diagnose diseases by evaluating exhaled gases, and even detect explosives and drugs. The device analyzes a gas mixture using semiconductor sensors.

“Smell is determined by a combination of existing gases in the atmosphere. It is found that the conductivity of the semiconductor probe changes during sedimentation of the gas molecules from the atmosphere. This allows determining their presence,” says Timur Muksunov. “During manufacture the sensor can be customized to react well to some gases, and react badly to the others.”

It is impossible...