A special sensor will identify the disease by its smell

An international group of scientists has created a system that identifies disease solely by chemicals in exhaled air. Before modern laboratory techniques were available, doctors diagnosed certain diseases by smelling their patients' breath. Scientists have been working for years on an analytical tool that could mimic this ability. Now, as they report in the journal ACS Nano , it's possible. They have identified a unique "breath fingerprint" (like a fingerprint) for each disease. Using this information, they designed a device that scans breath samples and classifies several types of diseases. Components of exhaled air Exhaled air contains nitrogen, carbon dioxide, oxygen, and small amounts of over 100 other volatile chemical compounds. The relative amounts of these substances vary depending on an individual's health status. Recently, several teams of scientists have developed experimental breath analyzers. However, most have focused on a single type of disease, such as cancer. Only Hossam Haick and his colleagues from 14 clinics around the world have developed an analyzer that can distinguish between multiple diseases. Breath analyzer Researchers developed an array of sensors that detect individual components of thousands of breath samples from healthy patients or those with one of 17 diseases, such as kidney cancer or Parkinson's disease. Analyzing the results using artificial intelligence, the team used the array to make diagnoses. Using mass spectrometry, they identified breath components associated with a given disease. The researchers discovered that each disease produces a unique volatile chemical fingerprint. They also demonstrated that the presence of one disease does not prevent the detection of other ailments.