Breath signatures of cerebral palsy patients revealed with mid-infrared FTIR spectroscopy

In the absence of “broadband” objective medical diagnostics, photonics technologies are now considered as a promising way to establish it. For example, being applied to human breath, under right conditions they should allow for unambiguous identification of metabolites circulating in blood and released in lungs alveoli as volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Nowadays, tremendous progress is achieved in developing laser-based mid-infrared spectrometers highly sensitive to VOCs [1,2]. Still, the spectral range covered by the laser spectrometers demonstrated so far, and signal-to-nose ratio (SNR) are not superior to conventional FTIR spectrometers based on thermal source. A significant amount of water vapour in breath is another, though general for all techniques, severe problem for VOCs detection. In addition to the detection, data analysis should be advanced in order to accurately compare healthy and diseased cohorts under study.