Infectious Disease

Non-invasive biomarker discovery with Breath Biopsy® could help to enable the early detection of infectious diseases by measuring volatile organic compounds in patients’ breath.

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Poster

Breath Biopsy reveals promising VOC biomarkers for early detection and monitoring of acute pulmonary exacerbations in people with cystic fibrosis.

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Paper

Detection of Clostridioides difficile infection by assessment of exhaled breath volatile organic compounds

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Infectious diseases are responsible for a huge global burden of disease that impacts public health systems and economies worldwide, especially affecting vulnerable populations.

Exhaled breath contains volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that have originated from many metabolic processes throughout the body. Research has indicated that VOCs present in breath are associated with infectious diseases, and therefore show promise as non-invasive biomarkers. Pathogenic microbes can alter the VOCs in breath either through altered metabolic pathways due to the host immune response, or with certain pathogens like bacteria and fungi, their own endogenous metabolic processes. VOCs originating from infection sites all over the body can be exchanged from the bloodstream into the air in the lungs at the alveolar membrane and exhaled in breath.

Some infectious diseases predominantly affect the lungs and other tissues in the respiratory tract such as the nose and throat. As breath is in direct contact with these tissues, analysis of breath can provide a better insight into local respiratory diseases as opposed to blood or urine which are more indirect. Exhaled breath offers a unique roster of potential biomarkers arising from an infection and can be collected completely non-invasively for infectious disease testing.