on-chip optical detection of odors

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The project aims at integrating into a functional prototype a recent technological breakthrough: an optical noseon chip made of a matrix of optical gas sensing pixels. Optical noses integrated on chip present numerousadvantages over electronic noses such as low power requirements, robustness, and immunity to electromagneticfields, remote sensing and lower price. Miniaturized on-chip sensor, designed to detect air-borne compounds,are essential for inexpensive monitoring systems that are portable and deployable on a large scale [1-2]. Givenour experience with on-chip optical devices and more specifically optical gas sensors we have developed in thepast, Odotech has required our help to investigate if on-chip optical sensors could answer its needs whileretaining satisfactory sensitivity. Within the frame of a recently completed NSERC Engage project withOdotech, we tailored the optical sensing device we developed previously, which is based on a reversibleabsorption of a gas with a dedicated polymer matrix. The sensor is integrated on chip and is therefore small,compact, and can be distributed in a network enabling low power consumption. We demonstrated that it canmonitor several volatile organic compounds (VOCs), such as alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, carboxylic acids,amines and aromatics, that it operates in a reversible fashion, under different environmental conditions(temperature and humidity), and that it detects concentrations in the order of parts per million (ppm). Theobjective of this NSERC INNOV proposal is to develop a fully functional prototype of an optical nosecomprising a 6-sensor matrix with integrated light source and detector.