As part of the program of the National Center for Research and Development of BIOSTRATEG III, there is a project entitled

“Forecasting threats to forest ecosystems through the implementation of an innovative electronic system for the recognition of odors”.

Implementation period: from January 2, 2018 to January 1, 2021 (36 months)

Co-financing amount: PLN 12,654,805.00

The threat of forests by various harmful microorganisms is visible in many regions of our country. In the situation where the use of chemicals is not acceptable, other methods remain to be used, in particular biological methods with the use of pheromones. The only measuring device that is useful in developing this kind of novel odor-based methods is a system called an electronic nose (e-NOS). As part of this project, an electronic device based on sensors with high sensitivity will be built and adapted to measure the degree of threat by selected particularly dangerous forest pests, such as Dendrolimus Pini L, and Phytophthora oomycetes. The electronic system being built will be based on “artificial intelligence” and a new matrix of sensors with selectivity and detection suitable for performing dedicated chemical analyzes. These matrices will create electronic noses that will recognize groups of analytes with appropriate selectivity and detection in the area of biological forest environment protection.

Due to the complex composition of mixtures of substances emitted by these systems, only using e-NOS with advanced analytical signal processing systems, such as artificial neural networks, and building databases of these signals will make the constructed e-NOS suitable for detecting the analytes sought in the field.