Sniffer dogs or "robot nose", which one would you prefer!

Guwahati: Sniffer dogs will one day be history and a tale for the kids as artificial prototype “robot nose” will replace it soon! Researchers, at present are working on developing the prototype based on odour receptors grown from the genes of mice that respond to target odours.

The artificial prototype of sniffer dogs is being developed by researchers from Duke University in the US. The striking part is that the “robot nose” is being developed by the scientists from living mouse cells and these cells can be used instead of dogs to sniff out narcotics and explosives.

Hiroaki Matsunami, a professor at Duke and corresponding author of the work published in Nature Communications said, “This idea of an artificial nose has been present for a long time. The receptors were identified in the 1990s, but there are significant technical hurdles to produce all these receptors and monitor the activity so that we can use that in an artificial device.”

Although there are “E-noses” even now which is used for sniffing, these use various chemical compounds to detect smells instead of receptor stem cells. The results of such devices are “not as good as a trained dog.” Hence, the developer said that “The idea is that by using the actual, living receptors, maybe we can develop a device similar to animals.” Matsunami further added, “Nobody has achieved that yet, but this study is moving toward that goal.”

As human, dog and mouse genomes contain around 20,000 genes, they are capable of creating proteins that smell, taste, feel, move and do everything that human bodies do. About 5% of mouse genes are capable of making odour receptors in comparison to the human who uses only about 2% of their genes to make odour receptors. Hence, the mouse genes used in artificial technology will obviously do better and bring out more accurate results.

Also read: International News