A CMUT - Based Electronic Nose for Real- Time Monitoring of Volatiles Emitted by Plants: Preliminary Results

Abstract

Plants give off a unique profile of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in response to abiotic and biotic stresses. The ability to discern specific VOC profiles provides for the early detection and subsequent treatment of insect infestation and pathogen infection. This work presents an electronic nose (e-nose) system based on a capacitive micromachined ultrasonic transducer (CMUT) with real-time monitoring capability for detecting and discriminating VOCs. Preliminary results show the almost instantaneous detection of the plant volatiles released systemically in response to physical wounding of plant tissue.