A breath of not-so-fresh air Tuesday, 10 January 2017

An international team of researchers has developed an 'artificially intelligent nanoarray' capable of quickly and inexpensively diagnosing and classifying diseases, based on the odours in a patient’s breath.

The two-part research program involved studying more than 1400 patients in five countries to confirm that different diseases could be characterised by chemical signatures identifiable in breath samples, as well as developing the sensors to detect the odours.

Professor Hossam Haick of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology Department of Chemical Engineering and Russell Berrie Nanotechnology Institute in Haifa, Israel led the research.

He says they identified 13 chemical components which appeared, in different compositions, in the breath of people with 17 different and unrelated diseases, including: lung cancer, colorectal cancer, head and neck cancer, ovarian cancer, bladder cancer, prostate cancer, kidney cancer, stomach cancer, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, irritable bowel syndrome, Parkinson’s disease (two types), multiple sclerosis, pulmonary hypertension, preeclampsia and chronic kidney disease.

“Each of these diseases is characterised by a unique fingerprint, meaning a different composition of these 13 chemical components," said Haick.  

"Just as each of us has a unique fingerprint that distinguishes us from others, each disease has a chemical signature that distinguishes it from other diseases and from a normal state of health. These odour signatures are what enables us to identify the diseases using the technology that we developed.”

The artificially intelligent nanoarray enables fast and inexpensive diagnosis and classification of diseases, based on “smelling” the patient’s breath, and using artificial intelligence to analyse the data obtained from the sensors. Some of the sensors are based on layers of gold nanoscale particles and others contain a random network of carbon nanotubes coated with an organic layer for sensing and identification purposes.

“Each of the sensors responds to a wide range of exhalation components and integration of the information provides detailed data about the unique breath signatures characteristic of the various diseases,” he said.

"Our system has detected and classified various diseases with an average accuracy of 86%."

He described breath as an excellent raw material for diagnosis.

“It is available without the need for invasive and unpleasant procedures, it’s not dangerous, and you can sample it again and again if necessary,” Haick said.

[Professor Hossam Haick with one of the sensors. Photo: Technion-Israel Institute of Technology]