Ž . Sensors and Actuators B 65 2000 216–219 www.elsevier.nlrlocatersensorb Human skin odor analysis by means of an electronic nose Corrado Di Natale a, ) , Antonella Macagnano a , Roberto Paolesse b , Enrico Tarizzo a , Alessandro Mantini a , Arnaldo D’Amico a a Department of Electronic Engineering, UniÕersity of Rome ‘‘Tor Vergata’’ Õia della Ricerca Scientifica, 00133 Rome, Italy b Department of Chemical Science and Technology, UniÕersity of Rome ‘‘Tor Vergata’’ Õia della Ricerca Scientifica, 00133 Rome, Italy Accepted 15 June 1999 Abstract Electronic noses have been applied to several disciplines such as food analysis, environmental control and industrial processes. In this paper the use of electronic noses in medicine is introduced and discussed. In this paper a review about the main features of human body odor is given. First experiments concerned with the measurement of the sensitivity of sensors towards a particular constituent of the skin odor, and preliminary results of a survey of skin-odor analysis in a population of individuals are reported. Findings encourage pursuing this research direction that can give rise to a better comprehension of the role of smell and odor in humans and, in the next future, to a novel diagnostic tool. q 2000 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved. Keywords: Human skin odor; Sensitivity; Electronic nose 1. Introduction It is well known that in animal phylum volatile com- pounds that identify the body odor play a fundamental role in regulating the social life, mainly with regard to sexual communications and relationships through the use of par- ticular volatile compounds called pheromones. Skin smells unquestionably influence human behaviour as well. Human odor results by the combined action of both skin gland and sectating organic compounds and whose regula- tion is subject to human hormonal control, and bacterial populations localized at skin surfaces, which live by me- tabolizing and transforming organic compounds that they Ž are able to absorb from their external environment Table . 1 . Any alteration of this equilibrium induces changes in both the nature and the amount of volatile compounds forming skin smell. The importance of odors in relation to Ž human health was understood by ancient medicine such as . Chinese medicine that commonly diagnosed human dis- eases also analyzing the body odor. Conventional western ) Corresponding author. Tel.: q 0039-6-7259-7348; fax: q 0039-6- 2020-519; e-mail: dinatale@eln.uniroma2.it medicine, on its own, recognized that some pathologies Ž produced unpleasant characteristic odors e.g., diabetes and . some hepatic diseases . As a consequence, the use of an electronic nose, which is a non-invasive probe, might be an eligible tool for the analysis of the chemical emissions Ž . from the body chemical imaging and secondly, can con- tribute to a diagnosis of diseases. This paper represents a first attempt towards this direc- tion. Hereafter two different measurements will be pre- sented: 1. the evaluation of the sensor’s sensitivity to an important compound of human sweat: 5a-androst-16-en-3-one; 2. a study of human skin odors in a population of students. 2. Biological factors determining human skin odor Human skin is known to be colonized by a huge number of bacteria that live as commensals on the surface and within the follicles. It is possible to describe the basic pattern of colonization of a healthy human skin. Variations of this pattern may be observed: dry skin supports a low level of colonization, while moist areas provided with sebaceous and apocrine glands are the most heavily popu- lated. 0925-4005r00r$ - see front matter q 2000 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved. Ž . PII: S0925-4005 99 00313-5