Smart Electronic Olfaction for Body Odor Diagnostics

Project Information

SMELLODI

Grant agreement ID: 101046369

DOI

10.3030/101046369

Project closed

EC signature date 14 March 2022

Start date 1 April 2022

End date 30 September 2025

Funded under

• The European Innovation Council (EIC)

Total cost

€ 3 263 781,25

EU contribution

€ 3 263 781,00

Coordinated by

TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAET DRESDEN
Germany

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - SMELLODI (Smart Electronic Olfaction for Body Odor Diagnostics)

Reporting period: 2023-04-01 to 2025-09-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Body odors provide valuable information that can assist in the early-stage detection of neurodegenerative or inflammatory diseases. While medically trained personnel routinely uses body odor perception, its usefulness for systematic diagnostics is hindered because the digitization of the olfactory sense is still underdeveloped compared to vision and hearing. The EU-funded project SMELLODI explored the fundamentals of electronic odor systems and exploited the gained knowledge to enable a science-to-technology breakthrough. Ultimately, this will enable the digital characterization of body odors and facilitate their on-demand synthesis with a newly developed Odor Display. The project combined innovative biomimetic sensor technology, clinical olfaction and psychological perception, chemistry, materials science, and machine learning techniques to develop technologies for remote medical diagnostics. These can be used to assist individuals with olfactory disorders and will provide healthcare professionals with standardized verbal information about patients’ body odors.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

Within the duration of SMELLODI, our team has laid out the basis for the characterization of the human body’s volatilome (BOV). For that purpose, more than 100 healthy participants and 70 patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment, Parkinson’s syndrome and COVID-19 have donated their body odors (axillary sweat, swabs from the skin at different body sites) in a standardized experimental procedure. The obtained samples were investigated for their chemical composition in a gas chromatography mass spectrometry analysis, and simultaneously an electronic “fingerprint” was determined using a commercialized electronic nose (eNose) of our partner SmartNanotubes Technologies GmbH. To ensure the reliable detection of body odor volatiles with the eNose device, the SMELLODI team has developed optimized sensors inspired by the biological principle of the human nose. A new type of sensors from SmartNanotubes Technologies using the functionalization based on different mucin-derived building blocks has been produced and was tested. To further guide the selection of the functionalization and to optimize the odor-receptor interaction in the future, computational studies of the interaction of odor molecules and the biomimetic receptors were performed.
Using the chemical analysis results and the eNose fingerprints, we investigated similarities and differences between the samples and combine them with human perception of body odors. To this end, in an international study with more than 2,000 participants from 21 countries, we have obtained vocabulary to describe body odors from different biological states, such as healthy, ill or body odor after doing exercise. The vocabulary was used to establish a description matrix for body odors, which will served as labels for the development of the prototype of an Odor Display and a newly functionalized version of the eNose device from SmartNanotubes Technologies.
In the end, SMELLODI created a proof of principle demonstrator for BOV (percept) synthesis and transmission over the communication network using the developed Odor Display. While the device is still limited to a small number of molecular components, it demonstrated the feasibility of the SMELLODI technology.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The technology envisioned in SMELLODI possesses high potential for long-term impact on society and economy. Health monitoring and rapid early diagnostics provide an opportunity for a substantial increase in quality of life for EU citizens and beyond and may also help reducing costs in the healthcare sector. Furthermore, the general technology of digitizing olfaction in a smart biomimetic way may help to pave the path for innovations in further applications of digital olfaction, ranging from shaping the “internet of senses”, and fostering smart home technology to safety and security-related applications.
So far, SMELLODI has established the necessary first steps towards enabling such a technology: 1) A set of SWCNT sensors was functionalized using biomimetic molecular receptors. The responses of these sensors showed an enhanced detection ability towards certain odor molecules and indicate promising performance in general. 2) A first version of a verbal description matrix for body odors was created which is based on the obtained vocabulary from nine of the 21 countries. Moreover, the measurements with the eNose device from SMELLODI partner SmartNanotubes Technologies were performed on the collected odor samples. 3) A prototype of the Odor Display was realized including the necessary software stack. 4) A computational workflow was implemented and used for the characterization of odor molecules and their interaction with sensing materials. This is a was a critical step towards a body odor database.
SMELLODI has achieved major milestones in engaging young researchers and raising interest in the scientific community of the different disciplines, in the general public and among industry. This was also reflected in the many requests to join SMELLODI as a widening partner. Using this “hop-on” process as an opportunity to extend and complement the existing expertise in the consortium, the team of Dr Robert Hanus from IOCB Prague successfully applied within the HORIZON-WIDERA-2022-ACCESS-07 call for joining the project in the summer of 2023. The SMELLODI consortium was contacted by companies and startup initiatives who were seeking expertise and consulting on their projects.