A FAST AND REPRODUCIBLE METHOD FOR GAS SENSOR SCREENING TO FLAVOR COMPOUNDS

The use of gas sensor arrays has taken a growing place in the field of gas sensor research. One of the main drawbacks of this method is the large amount of time necessary to collect the amount of calibration da ta, for a convenient task [1]. The purpose of this paper is to present a brand new method for fast and reproducible characterization and cal ibration of gas sensors. Surface acoustic wave (SAW) gas sensors are v ery sensitive [2,3], nevertheless their chemical adsorbant layer must still be optimized with respect to the gas species to be detected. For food control purposes, it has been shown that SnO2 sensors may be use ful [4-6]. This paper therefore deals with integrated semiconducting s ensors and their ability to detect flavours. Experimental results will be presented and discussed and finally some aspects of sensor array p rocessing, using artificial neural networks, will be explored.