A group of Turkish scientists has developed an artificial intelligence (AI)-based system that can detect coronavirus with 90 percent accuracy and is able to diagnose the infection within seconds.
The system consists of a device that scientists call an “electronic nose.” It is fed data via AI algorithms and learns to examine the breathing patterns of hundreds of patients.
Currently a prototype, the scientists plan to introduce it to hospitals for faster detection of coronavirus.
The project, conceived by professors Gökhan Silahtaroğlu and Mesut Yılmaz, actually began as a way to determine the quality of honey and the health of bees. However, when the pandemic broke out last year, Yılmaz and Silahtaroğlu decided to improve it for use in COVID -19 diagnosis.
“We started by putting sensors to measure air quality in beehives and feeding the data from there into the AI. The sensors were already being used to detect cancer and tuberculosis, and we decided to repurpose them to detect coronavirus. Using the sensors, we derived elements of the breath and digitized them. By matching them with polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, we managed to help the AI learn them,” Silahtaroğlu told Demirören News Agency (DHA) on Thursday. He said the device can also be used to diagnose other diseases, with data provided by patients.
The device was tested on 300 volunteers who applied for PCR tests at hospitals, and a comparison with the results showed its success, the scientists say. Mesut Yılmaz says the device can be used not only in hospitals but also in shopping malls, schools and other busy places that require rapid diagnosis.
“People are given balloons and asked to inflate them. The air inside the balloon is then read by the device, which examines the chemical activity in the lungs,” Yılmaz says, explaining how it works.
Turkish scientists had been working to develop a vaccine against the coronavirus, while some researchers are working on drugs to eliminate the virus. A similar “breath test” is also being developed by scientists at Bandırma Onyedi Eylül University.