Early Alzheimer’s Detection through VOC Analysis: A Novel Device Approach

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a progressive and degenerative brain disorder that affects memory, thinking, behavior, and cognitive function. Current research is being done on analyzing different mediums such as blood, breath, and bodily fluids, for finding biomarkers related to AD. Several breath volatile organic compounds (VOCs) have been linked in much higher concentrations in AD patients compared to healthy controls. Thus, VOC-based sensing has emerged as a promising approach for non-invasive and early detection of the disease. In this work, we present a portable, cost effective, and highly accurate VOC sensor-based device for non-invasive AD detection and progression monitoring. Our novel device utilizes state-of-the-art photoionization detection (PID) technology to selectively detect specific VOC biomarkers associated with AD, offering high sensitivity and specificity for AD detection. A user-friendly mobile-based application for the analysis and reporting of the data is also developed. The validity of our device is tested using different concentration samples of specific VOCs. This VOC-based device has the potential to address several current shortcomings in AD diagnosis and monitoring.