An Electronic Nose for Reliable Measurement and Correct Classification of Beverages

This paper reports the design of an electronic nose (E-nose) prototype for reliable measurement and correct classification of beverages. The prototype was developed and fabricated in the laboratory using commercially available metal oxide gas sensors and a temperature sensor. The repeatability, reproducibility and discriminative ability of the developed E-nose prototype were tested on odors emanating from different beverages such as blackcurrant juice, mango juice and orange juice, respectively. Repeated measurements of three beverages showed very high correlation (r > 0.97) between the same beverages to verify the repeatability. The prototype also produced highly correlated patterns (r > 0.97) in the measurement of beverages using different sensor batches to verify its reproducibility. The E-nose prototype also possessed good discriminative ability whereby it was able to produce different patterns for different beverages, different milk heat treatments (ultra high temperature, pasteurization) and fresh and spoiled milks. The discriminative ability of the E-nose was evaluated using Principal Component Analysis and a Multi Layer Perception Neural Network, with both methods showing good classification results

Pyridine vapors detection by an optical fibre sensor

An optical fibre sensor has been implemented towards pyridine vapors detection;to achieve this, a novel vapochromic material has been used, which, in solid state, suffers achange in colour from blue to pink-white in presence of pyridine vapours. This complex isadded to a solution of PVC (Poly Vinyl Chloride), TBP (Tributylphosphate) andtetrahydrofuran (THF), forming a plasticized matrix; by dip coating technique, the sensingmaterial is fixed onto a cleaved ended optical fibre. The fabrication process was optimizedin terms of number of dips and dipping speed, evaluating the final devices by dynamicrange. Employing a reflection set up, the absorbance spectra and changes in the reflectedoptical power of the sensors were registered to determine their response. A linear relationbetween optical power versus vapor concentration was obtained, with a detection limit of 1ppm (v/v).Financial support from the Spanish Comisión Interministerial de Ciencia y Tecnología within projects TEC2006-12170/MIC, TEC2004-05936-C02-01/MIC, BQU2001-3221, CTQ2005-09023 and Project of Excellence RNM666 de la Junta de Andalucía, is acknowledged

Real-Time Gas Identification by Analyzing the Transient Response of Capillary-Attached Conductive Gas Sensor

In this study, the ability of the Capillary-attached conductive gas sensor (CGS) in real-time gas identification was investigated. The structure of the prototype fabricated CGS is presented. Portions were selected from the beginning of the CGS transient response including the first 11 samples to the first 100 samples. Different feature extraction and classification methods were applied on the selected portions. Validation of methods was evaluated to study the ability of an early portion of the CGS transient response in target gas (TG) identification. Experimental results proved that applying extracted features from an early part of the CGS transient response along with a classifier can distinguish short-chain alcohols from each other perfectly. Decreasing time of exposition in the interaction between target gas and sensing element improved the reliability of the sensor. Classification rate was also improved and time of identification was decreased. Moreover, the results indicated the optimum interval of the early transient response of the CGS for selecting portions to achieve the best classification rates

Electronic Noses and Tongues: Applications for the Food and Pharmaceutical Industries

The electronic nose (e-nose) is designed to crudely mimic the mammalian nose in that most contain sensors that non-selectively interact with odor molecules to produce some sort of signal that is then sent to a computer that uses multivariate statistics to determine patterns in the data. This pattern recognition is used to determine that one sample is similar or different from another based on headspace volatiles. There are different types of e-nose sensors including organic polymers, metal oxides, quartz crystal microbalance and even gas-chromatography (GC) or combined with mass spectroscopy (MS) can be used in a non-selective manner using chemical mass or patterns from a short GC column as an e-nose or “Z” nose. The electronic tongue reacts similarly to non-volatile compounds in a liquid. This review will concentrate on applications of e-nose and e-tongue technology for edible products and pharmaceutical uses

In-Situ Ellipsometric Studies of Electrochemically Synthesized Thin Polyaniline Films

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