A Prototype of Graphene E-Nose for Exhaled Breath Detection and Label-Free Diagnosis of Helicobacter Pylori Infection

Helicobacter pylori (HP), a common microanaerobic bacteria that lives in the human mouth and stomach, is reported to infect ≈50% of the global population. The current diagnostic methods for HP are either invasive, time-consuming, or harmful. Therefore, a noninvasive and label-free HP diagnostic method needs to be developed urgently. Herein, reduced graphene oxide (rGO) is composited with different metal-based materials to construct a graphene-based electronic nose (e-nose), which exhibits excellent sensitivity and cross-reactive response to several gases in exhaled breath (EB). Principal component analysis (PCA) shows that four typical types of gases in EB can be well discriminated. Additionally, the potential of the e-nose in label-free detection of HP infection is demonstrated through the measurement and analysis of EB samples. Furthermore, a prototype of an e-nose device is designed and constructed for automatic EB detection and HP diagnosis. The accuracy of the prototype machine integrated with the graphene-based e-nose can reach 92% and 91% in the training and validation sets, respectively. These results demonstrate that the highly sensitive graphene-based e-nose has great potential for the label-free diagnosis of HP and may become a novel tool for non-invasive disease screening and diagnosis.

High-precision Helicobacter pylori infection diagnosis using a dual-element multimodal gas sensor array

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) is a globally widespread bacterial infection. Early diagnosis of this infection is vital for public and individual health. Prevalent diagnosis methods like the isotope 13C or 14C labelled urea breath test (UBT) are not convenient and may do harm to the human body. The use of cross-response gas sensor arrays (GSAs) is an alternative way for label-free detection of metabolite changes in exhaled breath (EB). However, conventional GSAs are complex to prepare, lack reliability, and fail to discriminate subtle changes in EB due to the use of numerous sensing elements and single dimensional signal. This work presents a dual-element multimodal GSA empowered with multimodal sensing signals including conductance (G), capacitance (C), and dissipation factor (DF) to improve the ability for gas recognition and H. pylori-infection diagnosis. Sensitized by poly(diallyldimethylammonium chloride) (PDDA) and the metal-organic framework material NH2-UiO66, the dual-element graphene oxide (GO)-composite GSAs exhibited a high specific surface area and abundant adsorption sites, resulting in high sensitivity, repeatability, and fast response/recovery speed in all three signals. The multimodal sensing signals with rich sensing features allowed the GSA to detect various physicochemical properties of gas analytes, such as charge transfer and polarization ability, enhancing the sensing capabilities for gas discrimination. The dual-element GSA could differentiate different typical standard gases and non-dehumidified EB samples, demonstrating the advantages in EB analysis. In a case-control clinical study on 52 clinical EB samples, the diagnosis model based on the multimodal GSA achieved an accuracy of 94.1%, a sensitivity of 100%, and a specificity of 90.9% for diagnosing H. pylori infection, offering a promising strategy for developing an accurate, non-invasive and label-free method for disease diagnosis.

An Evidence-Based Review of Application Devices for Nitric Oxide Concentration Determination from Exhaled Air in the Diagnosis of Inflammation and Treatment Monitoring

The measurement of nitric oxide (NO) in exhaled air is used in diagnostics and monitoring the pathologies not only in the respiratory system but also in the oral cavity. It has shown a huge increase in its level in asthma and diseases of the oral cavity. It seems reasonable to undertake research on the impact of inflammation on the level of NO in exhaled air. The aim of the study is to make an evidence-based review of the application of NO levels in exhaled air in the diagnosis of inflammation and treatment monitoring on the basis of selected measuring devices.

METHODS AND RESULTS

This paper presents an example of the application of NO measurement in exhaled air in individual human systems. Selected measuring devices, their non-invasiveness, and their advantages are described.

DISCUSSION

The usefulness of this diagnostic method in pathologies of the oral cavity was noted.

CONCLUSIONS

Measuring the level of NO in exhaled air seems to be a useful diagnostic method.

Measurement of the Level of Nitric Oxide in Exhaled Air in Patients Using Acrylic Complete Dentures and with Oral Pathologies

The measurement of nitric oxide (NO) in exhaled air is used in diagnostics and monitoring of the pathologies in the respiratory system but also in the oral cavity. Researchers have shown a huge increase of its level in asthma and diseases in the oral cavity. It seems reasonable to research the impact of pathologies in the oral cavity on the level of NO in exhaled air. The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of inflammation in the oral cavity (according to the material of dentures) on the level of nitric oxide in exhaled air. Three groups of patients were examined in this study. The hygiene of acrylic dentures, hard tissues, periodontal tissues, hygiene of the oral cavity, and level of NO in exhaled air were examined. Prosthetic stomatitis, denture plaque, tooth decay, poor sanitation and periodontitis increase levels of NO.

Exhaled breath analysis using cavity-enhanced optical techniques: a review

Cavity-enhanced absorption spectroscopies (CEAS) have gained importance in a wide range of applications in molecular spectroscopy. The development of optical sensors based on the CEAS techniques coupled with the continuous wave or pulsed laser sources operating in the mid-infrared or near-infrared spectral regime uniquely offers molecularly selective and ultra-sensitive detection of trace species in complex matrices including exhaled human breath. In this review, we discussed recent applications of CEAS for analyzing trace constituents within the exhaled breath matrix facilitating the non-invasive assessment of human health status. Next to a brief discussion on the mechanisms of formation of trace components found in the exhaled breath matrix related to particular disease states, existing challenges in CEAS and future development towards non-invasive clinical diagnostics will be discussed.