Polymer-coated MEMS chemical sensor array for monitoring oxidative stress by breath analysis

The paper presents a simulation study on polymer-coated MEMS (microelectromechanical system) sensor array for monitoring VOCs (volatile organic compounds) emissions in breath that are linked to oxidative stress in human body. The sensing polymers were selected on the basis of thermodynamic partition coefficient data analyzed by principal component analysis (PCA) and fuzzy c-means (FCM) clustering. The polymer functionalized sensor array provides transduction platform for MEMS electronic nose (E-nose). The E-nose responses patterns were synthesized for both the static and the dynamic modes of transduction for realistic analyte concentrations over ppm to ppb range and noise level. These were analyzed for discrimination of oxidative stress VOC markers in breath by monitoring separability in principal component space. The study suggests application of MEMS based electronic nose system for monitoring disease biomarkers in breath for clinical diagnostics.