Abstract
Continuous measurement of volatile organic compounds is expected for non-invasive monitoring of
metabolic functions and screening of diseases. Especially, acetone emitted through the skin is known for its
correlation to lipid metabolism and promising for detection of diabetes mellitus. However, the concentration
of transdermal acetone is estimated to be sub-ppb level, which requires highly sensitive and selective sensor .
Additionally, accurate standard acetone gas at sub-ppb level is also essential for evaluation of these sensors.
In our previous study, we developed a biofluorometric acetone gas sensor based on nicotinamide adenine
dinucleotide (NADH, excitation 340 nm, emission 490 nm)-dependent secondary alcohol dehydrogenase.
In this study, we evaluated the accuracy of concentration of acetone gas at the sub-ppb level, prepared by a
flow rate-based continuous dilution method. Then, the reliability of the acetone bio-sniffer was also
evaluated by correlation analysis between the signal obtained by gas chromatography-mass spectrometer
(GC-MS) and the acetone bio-sniffer at the same acetone gas. The outputs in both measurement methods
showed linear correlation (R2 = 0.996), indicating the reliability of the acetone bio-sniffer. In the future
works, continuous measurement of transdermal acetone at various locations on the body surface will be
conducted by using the acetone bio-sniffer.
