Daily, Diagnostics

A laser breathalyzer that detects disease

A new wave of disease diagnostics is breathalyzer technology that can identify the gases we exhale that are associated with disease.

Analyzing the gases we exhale is turning out to be a promising tool in broadscale disease detection. This has precedent: Dogs, for instance, have been known to sniff out cancer.

Researchers at the University of Adelaide in Australia are fine-tuning this breathalyzer concept: They’ve built a new laser that can measure the content of gas — or your breath — with “almost instant” results. They just published news of this spectrometer in Optics Express.

“Rather than sniffing out a variety of smells as a dog would, the laser system uses light to “sense” the range of molecules that are present in the sample,” researcher Dr. James Anstie said in a statement.

The laser sends up to a million different light frequencies through the breath sample in parallel. Each gas molecule absorbs the light at different molecule frequencies, and have a unique molecular fingerprint.

“We now have a robust system to be able to detect the presence and concentrations of molecules in a sample,” Anstie said. “The next step is to work out how to accurately sample and interpret the levels which will naturally vary from person to person.”

Researchers say a commercial product could be available within the next three to five years.

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