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| Dr. Ranjan Nanda demonstrates the device at an experimental stage. The electronic nose aims to diagnose tuberculosis without a lab test. |
A breathalyzer-like device that aims to detect tuberculosis, pneumonia and lung cancer from someone's breath could help replace time-consuming tests, researchers hope.
The electronic nose received a $950,000 grant from the federally funded Grand Challenges Canada and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on Monday, to try to develop the hand-held device for use in the developing world.
"It's almost like a breathalyzer test that the police might use for alcohol," Dr. Peter Singer, CEO of Grand Challenges Canada, said in an interview from New Delhi.
"If they can bring that to the window of your car, what we're trying to do is bring the diagnosis of tuberculosis to the door of the hut in the village where it really needs to reach."
Scientists say electronic noses could also be created for early detection of lung cancer and pneumonia, also based on signature biomarkers of disease detectable in a patient's breath.
Singer called the device a "bold idea" with potentially a big payoff in preventing the 1.7 million deaths from TB each year, mainly in the developing world. Up to 400,000 of them could be saved with better diagnosis, he said.
People may not think about diagnosis as life-saving, Singer said. But if a patient in a village isn’t diagnosed, it is very likely many others will be infected and then die.
For the prototype, someone breathes into the device, which has a little tub at the end to capture the sample, which is then tested.
The battery-powered technology is based on the finding that people with TB have a different biological signature in their breath.
The two-year grant will be use to validate the finding in four centres throughout India.
Dr. Ranjan Nanda of the New Delhi-based International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, one of the lead researchers on the electronic nose project, aims to have a validated prototype by December 2013.
If it works, it could be in use shortly after that, Singer said.
The existng sputum test for TB has challenges, especially for developing countries that may not have facilities or trained lab staff, says Dr. Michael Gardam, an infectious disease specialist with Toronto's University Health Network.
"It's just such a wonderful idea and it's such a simple idea," Gardam said. "The challenge is going to be, at the end of the day, can it jump through all the necessary hoops to actually be something that people can use?"
The development of the device is a collaboration between Nanda's centre and and Next Dimension Technologies in California.
CBC News
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