Tuberculosis Breakthrough as Scientists Get Funds for 'Electronic Nose'

Using grant funds announced Monday, researchers in India plan an October 2013 launch of a prototype new device to detect tuberculosis by sampling a patient’s breath. The money, $950,000, came from Grand Challenges Canada (GCC) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The device has been dubbed an “electronic nose” and compared to the breathalyzer used to detect drunk driving.

“At the moment, a person has to go to hospital at least twice, first for the test and then for the result,” said Delhi-based Dr. Ranjan Nanda, one of the lead researchers. “What we’re preparing can go to the countryside in any temperature, any humidity, so a person doesn’t have to travel and infect others on the way.”

“It’s a bold idea with a potentially big impact, developed by local innovators,” said Dr. Peter Singer, CEO of GCC, which seeks to improve health in the developing world. “It’s a diagnostic lifesaving device at the village level. Diagnosis is the weak link in the chain. With TB if you don’t diagnose someone in the village, that person will infect others and die.”

Using sensors developed in California, the battery-powered, hand-held device will check for changes in seven biomarker molecules. Scientists say the same technology also could be employed for the early detection of lung cancer and pneumonia based upon signature biomarkers of those diseases detectable in the breath.

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